Interaction of acetonitrile with alkaline metal cations: A density functional, coupled‐cluster, and quadratic configuration interaction study

A systematic quantum chemical study of CH 3 CN and its CH 3 CNM + 1:1 model adducts (M + ∈{Li + , Na + }) is presented, with respect to binding energetics, structural and vibrational force field changes. Several gradient‐corrected density functional levels of theory were employed (of both “pure” and “hybrid” character), together with the coupled cluster including double substitutions from the Hartree–Fock determinant (CCD) and quadratic configuration interaction including single and double substitutions (QCISD) methods [with the rather large 6‐311G(d,p) basis set], and their performances compared. The binding energy decompositions according to the Kitaura–Morokuma scheme and the reduced variational space self‐consistent field (RVS‐SCF) method have shown that the electrostatic plus polarization interaction terms are primarily responsible for overall stabilization, while the charge‐transfer term is negligibly small and virtually identical for both adducts. The computed harmonic vibrational frequencies for acetonitrile correlate excellently with the experimental ones ( r 2 >0.9998 for almost all cases, while for the BLYP level, r 2 =1). It is shown for the first time that the experimentally observed blue shifts of the ν CN mode are caused even by formation of 1:1 adducts, contrary to the previously accepted opinions. The CCD and QCISD, as well as the BPW91 and BP86 levels of theory predict almost excellently the ν CN mode blue shift upon adduct formation, while the BLYP and B3LYP levels perform significantly poorer. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Int J Quantum Chem, 2001