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Juan Soto

Publications and source records attributed to Juan Soto.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2006

A complete active space self-consistent field study of the photochemistry of nitrosamine.

Photodissociation mechanisms of nitrosamine (NH2NO) have been studied at the complete active space self-consistent field level of theory in conjunction with atomic-natural-orbital-type basis sets. In addition, the energies of all the critical points and the potential energy curves connecting them have been recomputed with the multiconfigurational second-order perturbation method. Ground state minimum of nitrosamine has a C1 nonplanar structure with the hydrogen atoms of the amino moiety out of the plane defined by the N-N-O bonds. Electronic transitions to the three lowest states are allowed by selection rules: (i) S0-->S3 (7.41 eV) has an oscillator strength of f=0.0006 and it is assigned as an (npO)0-->(piNO*)2 transition, (ii) S0-->S2 (5.86 eV) has an oscillator strength of f=0.14 and it is assigned as an npN-->piNO* transition, and (iii) S0-->S1 (2.98 eV) has an oscillator strength of f=0.002 and it is assigned as an npO-->piNO* transition. It is found that N-N bond cleavage is the most likely process in all the photochemical relevant states, namely, S1 (1 1A"), S2 (2 1A'), and T1 (1 3A"). While S1 and T1 yield exclusively homolytic dissociation: NH2NO-->NH2 (1 2B1)+NO(X 2Pi), on S2 the latter process constitutes the major path, but two additional minor channels are also available: adiabatic homolytic dissociation: NH2NO-->NH2 (1 2A1)+NO(X 2Pi), and adiabatic oxygen extrusion: NH2NO-->NH2N (1 3A1)+O(3P). The excited species NH2 (1 2A1) experiences a subsequent ultrafast decay to the ground state, the final products in all cases the fragments being in their lowest electronic state. We have not found a unimolecular mechanism connecting excited states with the ground state. In addition, homolytic dissociation in the ground state, tautomerizations to NHNOH and NHNHO, and intersystem crossings to T1 are considered. The most favorable process on this state is the isomerization to NHNOH.

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PubMed2006

Selection rules of the charge transfer mechanism of surface-enhanced Raman scattering: The effect of the adsorption on the relative intensities of pyrimidine bonded to silver nanoclusters.

Surface-enhanced Raman spectra (SERS) of pyrimidine recorded on a silver electrode have been analyzed on the basis of a resonant Raman (RR) process involving photoexcited charge transfer (CT) states of the metal-adsorbate surface complex. The main feature of the SERS of benzene and azine derivatives is the enhancement of the totally symmetric ring stretching mode 8a due to Franck-Condon contributions related to the CT transition. Although this behavior is observed in the SERS of pyrimidine, its spectrum is also characterized by the strong enhancement of the nontotally symmetric mode 8b. This peculiar feature can be explained only by the redistribution of the Franck-Condon factors between the 8ab pair of vibrations originated by the descent in symmetry occurring when pyrimidine is bonded to silver nanoclusters. This conclusion is a new evidence of the main role of the RR-CT enhancement mechanism in the SERS of aromatic molecules and shows once again the usefulness of the methodology developed by our group in order to analyze these complex spectra.

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PubMed2006

Effect of an S1/S0 conical intersection on the chemistry of nitramide in its ground state. A comparative CASPT2 study of the nitro-nitrite isomerization reactions in nitramide and nitromethane.

The potential energy surfaces for the dissociation of nitramide (NH(2)NO(2) --> NH(2) + NO(2)) and nitromethane (CH(3)NO(2) --> CH(3) + NO(2)) and the nitro-nitrite rearrangement of these nitrocompounds (RNO(2) --> RONO) as well as the dissociations of the nitrite isomers (RONO --> RO + NO) have been studied with the second-order multiconfigurational perturbation theory (CASPT2) by computation of numerical energy gradients for stationary points. It is found that multiconfigurational methods [CASPT2 and complete active space SCF (CAS-SCF)] predict that the isomerization of nitramide to NH(2)ONO occurs in a two-step mechanism: (i) NH(2)NO(2) --> NH(2) + NO(2) and (ii) NH(2) + NO(2) --> NH(2)ONO, the second step involving surmounting an activation barrier. Contrastingly, Hartree-Fock based approaches give isomerization as a one-step reaction. Additionally, both mono- and multiconfigurational methods predict that nitro-nitrite rearrangement of CH(3)NO(2) is a one-step process. The difference in the reaction mechanisms of these two isoelectronic molecules arises from the presence of an S(1)/S(0) conical intersection in nitramide which is absent in nitromethane.

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PubMed2006

Anchoring dyes into multidimensional large-pore zeolites: a prospective use as chromogenic sensing materials.

A versatile procedure for anchoring dyes into the pores of multidimensional zeolites by including organic dye precursors in the synthesis gel has been developed. To prove the concept, an aniline-functionalised zeolite Beta was obtained by reaction of triethylorthosilicate (TEOS), tetraethylammonium hydroxide, and N-methyl,N-(propyl-3-trimethoxysilyl)aniline (MPTMSA) in the presence of HF. Further extraction of the structure-directing agents resulted in a highly crystalline, white, functionalised zeolite Beta containing anchored aniline groups. Similar organic functionalised molecular sieves (OFMS) have been explored as novel catalysts, but, as far as we know, OFMS have never been used as precursors for dye-immobilisation or to design new solid-based host systems for selective molecular sensing processes as is reported here. In a second step the solids containing dyes were prepared by reaction of the hybrid material with the appropriate reactives to obtain tricyanovinylbenzene, triphenylpyrylium, azoic, and squaraine derivatives. All these reactions are straightforward and involve electrophilic aromatic substitution or diazotisation reactions at the electron-rich aniline ring. The final dye-functionalised solid materials were isolated by simple filtration and washing procedures and have been characterised by a number of techniques. In all cases the Beta structure of the solid remains unaltered. Among the large number of areas where dye-containing zeolites might be of importance, we were interested in testing their unconventional use as heterosupramolecular hosts in chromogenic protocols. To check their potential use as chemosensors, microporous solids with anchored triphenylpyrilium and squaraine dyes were selected and used as sensors for the chromogenic discrimination of amines. It was found that the response of both solids to amines was basically governed by the three-dimensional (3D) solid architecture that tuned the intrinsic unselective reactivity of the pyrylium dye. By using new solid-state supramolecular chemistry protocols we believe that these, and similar future dye-zeolite hosts, might be promising new sensor materials allowing the visible discrimination of selected target guests by size and/or polarity within families or closely related molecules.

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PubMed2006

CASPT2 study of the decomposition of nitrosomethane and its tautomerization reactions in the ground and low-lying excited states.

The dissociation reaction of nitrosomethane into methyl and nitric oxide and the tautomerization reactions to formaldehyde oxime, nitrone, and methoxy nitrene have been studied with the second-order multiconfigurational perturbation theory (CASPT2) by the computation of numerical energy gradients. The prevailing reactions in both the ground and the excited states are dissociations. The structures of the ground and excited states are compared with the corresponding complete active space SCF (CAS-SCF) geometries. It is found that changes in the individual bond lengths are rather large (0.01-0.02 A), while the character and energetics of the CASPT2 optimizations remain similar to the CAS-SCF values.

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PubMed2005

Photodissociation mechanism of nitramide: a CAS-SCF and MS-CASPT2 study.

The complete active space self-consistent field (CAS-SCF) method combined with the multistate second-order perturbation theory (MS-CASPT2) are used to study the low-lying, singlet and triplet, potential energy surfaces of nitramide. Vertical transition calculations have allowed us to reinterpret the gas-phase UV spectrum of nitramide as the overlapping of two intense bands calculated at 6.46 and 6.52 eV, respectively. The states of relevance in its photochemistry after excitation at different wavelengths have been determined to be up to S4. From that point on, the most probable dissociation mechanism is determined by considering relative energies among the different stationary points and the major role played by conical intersections connecting S3/S2, S2/S1, and S1/S0 electronic states. The most likely dissociation products are NH2(1(2)B1), NO2(1(2)A1), NO2(1(2)A2), NO2(1(2)B2), NO2(1(2)A1)*, NH2NO(1(1)A''), NO(X(2)pi), and O(1D). With regards to the influence of triplet states in the photodecomposition of nitramide, our calculations indicate that T1/S0 crossing is probable only after radiationless deactivation.

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PubMed2005

Role of surface crossings in the photochemistry of nitromethane.

The photodissociation dynamics of nitromethane (CH(3)NO(2)) starting at the S(3) excited state has been studied at the complete active space self-consistent field level of theory in conjunction with atomic natural orbital type basis sets. In addition, the energies of all the critical points and the energy profiles connecting them have been recomputed with the multiconfigurational second-order perturbation method. It is found that the key step in the reaction mechanism is a radiationless decay through an S(3)S(2) conical intersection. The branching space spanned by the gradient difference and nonadiabatic coupling vectors of this crossing point comprises dissociation into excited nitromethane plus singlet atomic oxygen [CH(3)NO(1A")+O((1)D)] and S(3)-->S(2) deactivation, respectively. Furthermore, deactivated nitromethane S(n (n<3)) can decompose in subsequent steps into CH(3)+NO(2), where NO(2) is generated at least in two different electronic states (1 (2)B(2) and 1 (2)A(1)). It is shown that formation of excited nitric oxide NO(A (2)Sigma) arises from CH(3)NO(1A") generated in the previous step. In addition, four crossings between singlet and triplet states are localized; however, no evidence is found for a relevant role of such crossings in the photochemistry of CH(3)NO(2) initiated at S(3) state in the gas phase.

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PubMed2005

Rational design of a chromo- and fluorogenic hybrid chemosensor material for the detection of long-chain carboxylates.

A strategy for the rational design of a new optical sensor material for the selective recognition of long-chain carboxylates in water is presented. The approach relies on the combination of structure-property relationships to single out the optimal molecular sensor unit and the tuning of the sensing characteristics of an inorganic support material. A spacer-substituted 7-urea-phenoxazin-3-one was employed as the signaling moiety and a mesoporous trimethylsilylated UVM-7 (MCM-41 type) material served as the solid support. The sensor material shows the advantageous features of both modules that is absorption and emission in the visible spectral range, a fluorescence red-shift and enhancement upon analyte coordination, and the amplification of noncovalent (binding) and hydrogen-bonding (recognition) interactions in the detection event. Besides these basic results that are related to the design and performance of the sensor material, the paper discusses general aspects of amido-substituted phenoxazinone photophysics and addresses some general features of molecular anion recognition chemistry in aqueous vs nonaqueous media, utilizing steady-state and time-resolved optical as well as NMR spectroscopies. Detailed studies on potentially competing biochemical species and a first access to the schematic model of the response of the sensor material as obtained by a combination of fluorescence lifetime distribution analysis and Langmuir-type fitting of the gross binding constants complement the key issues of the paper.

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PubMed2004

Multiconfigurational second-order perturbation study of the decomposition of the radical anion of nitromethane.

The doublet potential energy surfaces involved in the decomposition of the nitromethane radical anion (CH(3)NO(2) (-)) have been studied by using the multistate extension of the multiconfigurational second-order perturbation method (MS-CASPT2) in conjunction with large atomic natural orbital-type basis sets. A very low energy barrier is found for the decomposition reaction: CH(3)NO(2) (-)-->[CH(3)NO(2)](-)-->CH(3)+NO(2) (-). No evidence has been obtained on the existence of an isomerization channel leading to the initial formation of the methylnitrite anion (CH(3)ONO(-)) which, in a subsequent reaction, would yield nitric oxide (NO). In contrast, it is suggested that NO is formed through the bimolecular reaction: CH(3)+NO(2) (-)-->[CH(3)O-N-O](-)-->CH(3)O(-)+NO. In particular, the CASSCF/MS-CASPT2 results indicate that the methylnitrite radical anion CH(3)ONO(-) does not represent a minimum energy structure, as concluded by using density functional theory (DFT) methodologies. The inverse symmetry breaking effect present in DFT is demonstrated to be responsible for such erroneous prediction.

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