Posts Tagged ‘energy differences’

Reproducibility in science: calculated kinetic isotope effects for cyclopropyl carbinyl radical.

Saturday, July 11th, 2015

Previously on the kinetic isotope effects for the Baeyer-Villiger reaction, I was discussing whether a realistic computed model could be constructed for the mechanism. The measured KIE or kinetic isotope effects (along with the approximate rate of the reaction) were to be our reality check. I had used ΔΔG energy differences and then HRR (harmonic rate ratios) to compute[1] the KIE, and Dan Singleton asked if I had included heavy atom tunnelling corrections in the calculation, which I had not. His group has shown these are not negligible for low-barrier reactions such as ring opening of cyclopropyl carbinyl radical.[2] As a prelude to configuring his suggested programs for computing tunnelling (GAUSSRATE and POLYRATE), it was important I learnt how to reproduce his KIE values.[2] Hence the title of this post. Now, read on.

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References

  1. Rzepa, Henry S.., "KINISOT. A basic program to calculate kinetic isotope effects using normal coordinate analysis of transition state and reactants.", 2015. http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19272
  2. O.M. Gonzalez-James, X. Zhang, A. Datta, D.A. Hrovat, W.T. Borden, and D.A. Singleton, "Experimental Evidence for Heavy-Atom Tunneling in the Ring-Opening of Cyclopropylcarbinyl Radical from Intramolecular 12C/13C Kinetic Isotope Effects", Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 132, pp. 12548-12549, 2010. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/ja1055593

The mysteries of stereoinduction.

Thursday, July 1st, 2010

Stereo-induction is, lets face it, a subtle phenomenon. The ratio of two stereoisomers formed in a reaction can be detected very accurately by experiment, and when converted to a free energy difference using ΔG = -RT Ln K, this can amount to quite a small value (between 0.5 – 1.5 kcal/mol). Can modelling reproduce effects originating from such small energy differences? Well one system that has been argued about now for several decades is shown below as 1.

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