Influence of smoking heating up tobacco products and e-cigarettes on the microbiota of dental plaque.

Unlabelled: Electronic nicotine delivery devices (ENDDs) are getting more and more popular among adolescents and young people under 25, signifying the beginning of tobacco product use for many of them. The state of the local microbiota can be affected by a large number of factors, namely the inhaled aerosol temperature, the oral cavity ph, the diet nature, genetics, etc.

Aim: The aim of the study was to identify the changes of dental microbiocenosis among adolescents who use devices for heating tobacco products and vape.

Atom-Cage Charge Transfer in Endohedral Metallofullerenes: Trapping Atoms Within a Sphere-Like Ridge of Avoided Crossings.

Endohedral fullerences have great potential for a variety of techological applications. Here we consider B@C60 and show that the amount of charge transfer from the semimetal boron atom to the cage is a strong function of the radial distance of the atom from the center of the fullerene, and it is controlled by multistate conical intersections whose associated ridge of avoided crossings has the topology of a Euclidean sphere. The potential energy surfaces of B@C60 are characterized by two kinds of local minima: those with a boron atom located in the geometric center of the fullerene, and those with a boron atom bound to the fullerene inner wall.

Metal-organic charge transfer can produce biradical states and is mediated by conical intersections.

The present paper illustrates key features of charge transfer between calcium atoms and prototype conjugated hydrocarbons (ethylene, benzene, and coronene) as elucidated by electronic structure calculations. One- and two-electron charge transfer is controlled by two sequential conical intersections. The two lowest electronic states that undergo a conical intersection have closed-shell and open-shell dominant configurations correlating with the 4s(2) and 4s(1)3d(1) states of Ca, respectively.

Communication: Energetics of reaction pathways for reactions of ethenol with the hydroxyl radical: the importance of internal hydrogen bonding at the transition state.

We find high multireference character for abstraction of H from the OH group of ethenol (also called vinyl alcohol); therefore we adopt a multireference approach to calculate barrier heights for the various possible reaction channels of OH+C(2)H(3)OH. The relative barrier heights of ten possible saddle points for reaction of OH with ethenol are predicted by multireference Møller-Plesset perturbation theory with active spaces based on correlated participating orbitals (CPOs) and CPO plus a correlated pi orbital (CPO+pi). Six barrier heights for abstracting H from a C-H bond range from 3.

Gradient-based multiconfiguration Shepard interpolation for generating potential energy surfaces for polyatomic reactions.

This paper describes and illustrates a way to construct multidimensional representations of reactive potential energy surfaces (PESs) by a multiconfiguration Shepard interpolation (MCSI) method based only on gradient information, that is, without using any Hessian information from electronic structure calculations. MCSI, which is called multiconfiguration molecular mechanics (MCMM) in previous articles, is a semiautomated method designed for constructing full-dimensional PESs for subsequent dynamics calculations (classical trajectories, full quantum dynamics, or variational transition state theory with multidimensional tunneling). The MCSI method is based on Shepard interpolation of Taylor series expansions of the coupling term of a 2 x 2 electronically diabatic Hamiltonian matrix with the diagonal elements representing nonreactive analytical PESs for reactants and products.

Non-Hermitian Multiconfiguration Molecular Mechanics.

We present a new version of the multiconfiguration molecular mechanics (MCMM) algorithm for fitting potential energy surfaces of complex reactive systems. The main improvement consists in allowing the valence bond configuration interaction matrix to be non-Hermitian, which broadens the range of geometries over which the potential energy surface can be fit accurately. A second improvement is that the new algorithm has simpler gradients and Hessians and executes faster.

Thermochemical kinetics for multireference systems: addition reactions of ozone.

The 1,3-dipolar cycloadditions of ozone to ethyne and ethene provide extreme examples of multireference singlet-state chemistry, and they are examined here to test the applicability of several approaches to thermochemical kinetics of systems with large static correlation. Four different multireference diagnostics are applied to measure the multireference characters of the reactants, products, and transition states; all diagnostics indicate significant multireference character in the reactant portion of the potential energy surfaces. We make a more complete estimation of the effect of quadruple excitations than was previously available, and we use this with CCSDT/CBS estimation of Wheeler et al.

Efficient global representations of potential energy functions: trajectory calculations of bimolecular gas-phase reactions by multiconfiguration molecular mechanics.

Multiconfiguration molecular mechanics (MCMM) was previously applied to calculate potential energies, gradients, and Hessians along a reaction path and in the large-curvature tunneling swath, and it was shown that one could calculate variational transition state theory rate constants with optimized multidimensional tunneling without requiring more than a few electronic structure Hessians. It was also used for molecular dynamics simulations of liquid-phase potentials of mean force as functions of a reaction coordinate. In the present article we present some improvements to the formalism and also show that with these improvements we can use the method for the harder problem of trajectory calculations on gas-phase bimolecular reactive collisions.

Multireference Model Chemistries for Thermochemical Kinetics.

By combining the generalized valence bond ansatz of correlated participating orbitals (CPO) with the complete-active-space prescription for selecting configurations and with the use of multireference second order perturbation theory (MRMP2) for including dynamical correlation, we define three levels of multireference (MR) theoretical model chemistries for electronic structure calculations of chemical reaction energies and barrier heights. The three levels differ in their choice of which orbitals are considered to be participating; the choices are called nominal (nom-CPO), moderate (mod-CPO), and extended (ext-CPO). Combining any of these three choices with a method for treatment of dynamical correlation energy and a one-electron basis set yields a theoretical model chemistry.

A unified perspective on the hydrogen atom transfer and proton-coupled electron transfer mechanisms in terms of topographic features of the ground and excited potential energy surfaces as exemplified by the reaction between phenol and radicals.

The relation between the hydrogen atom transfer (HAT) and proton-coupled electron transfer (PCET) mechanisms is discussed and is illustrated by multiconfigurational electronic structure calculations on the ArOH + R(*) --> ArO(*) + RH reactions. The key topographic features of the Born-Oppenheimer potential energy surfaces that determine the predominant reaction mechanism are the conical intersection seam of the two lowest states and reaction saddle points located on the shoulders of this seam. The saddle point corresponds to a crossing of two interacting valence bond states corresponding to the reactant and product bonding patterns, and the conical intersection corresponds to the noninteracting intersection of the same two diabatic states.

Reactions of hydrogen atom with hydrogen peroxide.

Rate coefficients are calculated using canonical variational transition state theory with multidimensional tunneling (CVT/SCT) for the reactions H + H2O2 --> H2O + OH (1a) and H + H2O2 --> HO2 + H2 (1b). Reaction barrier heights are determined using two theoretical approaches: (i) comparison of parametrized rate coefficient calculations employing CVT/SCT to experiment and (ii) high-level ab initio methods. The evaluated experimental data reveal considerable variations of the barrier height for the first reaction: although the zero-point-exclusive barrier for (1a) derived from the data by Klemm et al.

Global Potential Energy Surfaces with Correct Permutation Symmetry by Multiconfiguration Molecular Mechanics.

In the framework of the previously developed multiconfiguration molecular mechanics (MCMM) method, we present a new algorithm for constructing global potential energy surfaces that are invariant with respect to the exchange of identical nuclei. We illustrate the new algorithm by its application to the HOH' ' + H' → OH + H'H' ', OH' + HH' ', OH' ' + HH', HOH' + H' ', and H' 'OH' + H reactions. As part of the MCMM methodology, the new scheme can be used to generate multidimensional global PESs for both small and large systems where a few reaction pathways need to be treated as symmetrically equivalent.

Optimizing the performance of the multiconfiguration molecular mechanics method.

Multiconfiguration molecular mechanics (MCMM) is a general algorithm for constructing potential energy surfaces for reactive systems (Kim, Y.; Corchado, J. C.

Multiconfiguration Molecular Mechanics Based on Combined Quantum Mechanical and Molecular Mechanical Calculations.

The multiconfiguration molecular mechanics (MCMM) method is a general algorithm for generating potential energy surfaces for chemical reactions by fitting high-level electronic structure data with the help of molecular mechanical (MM) potentials. It was previously developed as an extension of standard MM to reactive systems by inclusion of multidimensional resonance interactions between MM configurations corresponding to specific valence bonding patterns, with the resonance matrix element obtained from quantum mechanical (QM) electronic structure calculations. In particular, the resonance matrix element is obtained by multidimensional interpolation employing a finite number of geometries at which electronic-structure calculations of the energy, gradient, and Hessian are carried out.

How well can density functional methods describe hydrogen bonds to pi acceptors?

We employed four newly developed density functional theory (DFT) methods for the calculation of five pi hydrogen bonding systems, namely, H2O-C6H6, NH3-C6H6, HCl-C6H6, H2O-indole, and H2O-methylindole. We report new coupled cluster calculations for HCl-C6H6 that support the experimental results of Gotch and Zwier. Using the best available theoretical and experimental results for all five systems, our calculations show that the recently proposed MPW1B95, MPWB1K, PW6B95, and PWB6K methods give accurate energetic and geometrical predictions for pi hydrogen bonding interactions, for which B3LYP fails and PW91 is less accurate.

Theoretical study on the group 2 atoms + N2O reactions.

The electronic structure aspects of the M (1S,3P) + N2O(X 1sigma+) (M = Be, Mg, Ca) reactions are investigated using the CASSCF/MRMP2 (complete active space SCF and the multireference Møller-Plesset perturbation theory of the second order) computational methodology. The lowest adiabatic 1 1A' and 1 3A' potential energy surfaces (PESs) favor the bending dissociation mechanism of N2O in all studied cases. The rate-limiting channels are determined by the classical barriers that decrease in the series Be (8.

Theoretical vibrational analysis of monohalogenated phenols.

Harmonic vibrational frequencies of a representative series of X-phenols (X = F, Cl, Br) in ortho, meta and para positions are determined using density functional theory (B3LYP) in conjunction with 6-311 + + G(d,p), 6-311 + + G(2d,2p), and 6-311 + + G(2df,2p) basis sets. Their complete and clear-cut vibrational assignment based on the concept of the potential energy distribution is carried out. Such assignment allows to resolve a number of uncertainties appeared in the previous studies and to propose a new explanation of frequency alterations of particular vibrational modes in this series.