Gregurick S.K., Chaban G.M., Gerber R.B.
University of Maryland, US
Keywords: anharmonic vibrational spectroscopy, IVR, NMA
The second-order M•oller-Plesset ab initio electronic structure method is used to compute points for the anharmonic mode-coupled potential energy surface of N-methylacetamide (NMA) in the transct configuration, including all degrees of freedom. The vibrational states and the spectroscopy are directly computed from this potential surface using the Correlated Corrected Vibrational Self-Consistent Field (CC-VSCF) method. The results are compared with CC-VSCF calculations using both the standard and improved empirical Amber-like force fields and available low temperature experimental matrix data. Analysis of our calculated spectroscopic results show that: (1). The excellent agreement between the ab initio CC-VSCF calculated frequencies and the experimental data suggest that the derived anharmonic potentials for N-methylacetamide are of a very high quality. (2). For most transitions, the vibrational frequencies obtained from the ab initio CC-VSCF method are superior to those obtained using the empirical CC-VSCF methods, when compared with experimental data. However, the improved empirical force field do yield better agreement to the experimental frequencies as compared with a standard AMBER-type force field. (3) The empirical force field in particular overestimates anharmonic couplings for the amide II mode, some of the methyl asymmetric bending modes, some of the out-of-plane methyl bending mode, and the methyl distortions. (4) Disagreement between the ab initio and empirical anharmonic couplings is greater than the disagreement between the frequencies. (5) However both the empirical and ab initio CC-VSCF calculations predict a negligible anharmonic coupling between the amide I and other internal modes. The implications of this is that the intramolecular energy ow between the amide I and the other intermolecular modes may be smaller than anticipated. These results may have important implications for the anharmonic force fields of peptides, for which N-methylacetamide is a model.
Journal: TechConnect Briefs
Volume: 2, Technical Proceedings of the 2001 International Conference on Computational Nanoscience and Nanotechnology
Published: March 19, 2001
Pages: 177 - 179
Industry sector: Advanced Materials & Manufacturing
Topic: Informatics, Modeling & Simulation
ISBN: 0-9708275-3-9