De Vita, Alessandro

Doni, Giovanni

Filip, Sorin V.

Gold, Martin

Riello, Massimo

Massimo Riello

Giovanni Doni

Sorin V. Filip

Martin Gold

Alessandro De Vita

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The Journal of Physical Chemistry B

Pressure-Induced Conformation Transition of <i>o</i>-Phenylene Solvated in Bulk Hydrocarbons

The conformational behavior of o-phenylene 8-mers and 10-mers solvated in a series of linear alkane solvents by means of classical molecular dynamics and first-principles calculations was studied. Irrespective of the solvent used, we find that at ambient pressure the molecule sits in the well-defined close-helical arrangement previously observed in light polar solvents. However, for pressures greater than 50 atm, and for tetradecane or larger solvent molecules, our simulations predict that o-phenylene undergoes a conformational transition to an uncoiled, extended geometry with a 35% longer head-to-tail distance and a much larger overlap between its lateral aromatic ring groups. The free energy barrier for the transition was studied as a function of pressure and temperature for both solute molecules in butane and hexadecane. Gas-phase density functional theory-based nudged elastic band calculations on 8-mer and 10-mer o-phenylene were used to estimate how the pressure-induced transition energy barrier changes with solute length. Our results indicate that a sufficiently large solvent molecule size is the key factor enabling a configuration transition upon pressure changes and that longer solute molecules associate with higher conformation transition energy barriers. This suggests the possibility of designing systems in which a solute molecule can be selectively activated by a controlled conformation transition achieved at a predefined set of pressure and temperature conditions.</p

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Pressure-induced conformation transition of o -phenylene solvated in bulk hydrocarbons

Pressure-induced conformation transition of o -phenylene solvated in bulk hydrocarbons

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