Abstract
Quantum chemical investigation of bimolecular hydrogen transfer involving alkylperoxy radicals, a key reaction family in the free-radical oxidation of hydrocarbons, was performed to establish structure-reactivity relationships. Eight different reactions were investigated featuring four different alkane substrates (methane, ethane, propane and isobutane) and two different alkylperoxy radicals (methylperoxy and iso-propylperoxy). Including forward and reverse pairs, sixteen different activation energies and enthalpies of reaction were used to formulate structure-reactivity relationships to describe this chemistry. We observed that the enthalpy of formation of loosely bound intermediate states has a strong inverse correlation with the overall heat of reaction and that this results in unique contra-thermodynamic behavior such that more exothermic reactions have higher activation barriers. A new structure-reactivity relationship was proposed that fits the calculated data extremely well: EA = Eo + αΔHrxn where α = -0.70 for ΔHrxn < 0, and α = 1.10 for ΔHrxn > 0 and Eo = 3.05 kcal mol-1.
Original language | English (US) |
---|---|
Pages (from-to) | 1969-1978 |
Number of pages | 10 |
Journal | ChemPhysChem |
Volume | 8 |
Issue number | 13 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Sep 17 2007 |
Keywords
- Ab initio calculations
- Density functional calculations
- Hydrogen bonds
- Hydrogen transfer
- Radicals
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics
- Physical and Theoretical Chemistry