Chirped-Pulse and Cavity-Based Fourier Transform Microwave Spectra of the Methyl Lactate⋅⋅⋅Ammonia Adduct (original) (raw)
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Sensing Chirality with Rotational Spectroscopy
Annual review of physical chemistry, 2018
Chiroptical spectroscopy techniques for the differentiation of enantiomers in the condensed phase are based on an established paradigm that relies on symmetry breaking using circularly polarized light. We review a novel approach for the study of chiral molecules in the gas phase using broadband rotational spectroscopy, namely microwave three-wave mixing, which is a coherent, nonlinear, and resonant process. This technique can be used to generate a coherent molecular rotational signal that can be detected in a manner similar to that in conventional Fourier transform microwave spectroscopy. The structure (and thermal distribution of conformations), handedness, and enantiomeric excess of gas-phase samples can be determined unambiguously by employing tailored microwave fields. We discuss the theoretical and experimental aspects of the method, the significance of the first demonstrations of the technique for enantiomer differentiation, and the method's rapid advance into a robust cho...
Applied Spectroscopy, 2011
Determination of the absolute handedness, known as absolute configuration (AC), of chiral molecules is an important step in any field related to chirality, especially in the pharmaceutical industry. Vibrational optical activity (VOA) has become a powerful tool for the determination of the AC of chiral molecules in the solution state after nearly forty years of evolution. VOA offers a novel alternative, or supplement, to X-ray crystallography, permitting AC determinations on neat liquid, oil, and solution samples without the need to grow single crystals of the pure chiral sample molecules as required for X-ray analysis. By comparing the sign and intensity of the measured VOA spectrum with the corresponding ab initio density functional theory (DFT) calculated VOA spectrum of a chosen configuration, one can unambiguously assign the AC of a chiral molecule. Comparing measured VOA spectra with calculated VOA spectra of all the conformers can also provide solution-state conformational populations. VOA consists of infrared vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) and vibrational Raman optical activity (ROA). Currently, VCD is used routinely by researchers in a variety of backgrounds, including molecular chirality, asymmetric synthesis, chiral catalysis, drug screening, pharmacology, and natural products. Although the application of ROA in AC determination lags behind that of VCD, with the recent implementation of ROA subroutines in commercial quantum chemistry software, ROA will in the future complement VCD for AC determination. In this review, the basic principles of the application of VCD to the determination of absolute configuration in chiral molecules are described. The steps required for VCD spectral measurement and calculation are outlined, followed by brief descriptions of recently published papers reporting the determination of AC in small organic, pharmaceutical, and natural product molecules.
Theor Chem Acc, 2008
The Absolute configuration (AC) of the chiral alkane D 3 -anti-trans-anti-trans-anti-trans-perhydrotriphenylene (PHTP), 1, is determined by comparison of density functional theory (DFT) calculations of its vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) and optical rotation (OR) to the experimental VCD and OR of (+)−1, obtained in high enantiomeric excess using chiral gas chromatography. Conformational analysis of 1 demonstrates that the all-chair (CCCC) conformation is the lowest in energy and that other conformations are too high in energy to be significantly populated at room temperature. The B3PW91/TZ2P calculated IR spectrum of the CCCC conformation of 1 is in excellent agreement with the experimental IR spectrum, confirming the conformational analysis and demonstrating the excellent accuracy of the B3PW91 functional and the TZ2P basis set. The B3PW91/TZ2P calculated VCD spectrum of the CCCC conformation of S-1 is in excellent agreement with the experimental VCD spectrum of (+)−1, unambiguously defining the AC of 1 to be S(+)/R(−). The B3LYP/aug-cc-pVDZ calculated OR of S-1 over the range 589-365 nm has the same sign and dispersion as the experimental OR of (+)−1, further supporting the AC S(+)/R(−). Our results confirm the AC proposed earlier by Farina and Audisio. This study provides a further demonstration of the excellent accuracy of VCD spectra predicted using Stephens' equation for vibrational rotational strengths together with the ab initio DFT methodology, and further documents the utility of VCD spectroscopy in determining the ACs of chiral molecules.
The Journal of Organic Chemistry, 2012
Chiroptical techniques are increasingly employed for assigning the absolute configuration of chiral molecules through comparison of experimental spectra with theoretical predictions. For assignment of natural products, electronic chiroptical spectroscopies such as electronic circular dichroism (ECD) are routinely applied. However, the sensitivity of electronic spectral parameters to experimental conditions and the theoretical methods employed can lead to incorrect assignments. Vibrational chiroptical methods (vibrational circular dichroism, VCD, and Raman optical activity, ROA) provide more reliable assignments, although they, in particular ROA, have been little explored for assignments of natural products. In this study, the ECD, VCD, and ROA chiroptical spectroscopies are evaluated for the assignment of the absolute configuration of a highly flexible natural compound with two stereocenters and an asymmetrically substituted double bond, the marine antibiotic Synoxazolidinone A (SynOxA), recently isolated from the sub-Arctic ascidian Synoicum pulmonaria. Conformationally averaged nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), ECD, Raman, ROA, infrared (IR) and VCD spectral parameters are computed for the eight possible stereoisomers of SynOxA and compared to experimental results. In contrast to previously reported results, the stereochemical assignment of SynOxA based on ECD spectral bands is found to be unreliable. On the other hand, ROA spectra allow for a reliable determination of the configuration at the double bond and the ring stereocenter. However, ROA is not able to resolve the chlorine-substituted stereogenic center on the guanidinium side chain of SynOxA. Application of the third chiroptical method, VCD, indicates unique spectral features for all eight SynOxA isomers in the theoretical spectra. Although the experimental VCD is weak and restricted by the limited amount of sample, it allows for a tentative assignment of the elusive chlorine-substituted stereocenter. VCD chiroptical analysis of a SynOxA derivative with three stereocenters, SynOxC, results in the same absolute configuration as for SynOxA. Despite the experimental challenges, the results convincingly prove that the assignment of absolute configuration based on vibrational chiroptical methods is more reliable than for ECD.
Chirality, 2003
Advances in the measurement, calculation, and application of vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) for the determination of absolute configuration are described. The purpose of the review is to provide an up-to-date perspective on the capability of VCD to solve problems of absolute stereochemistry for chiral molecules primarily in the solution state. The scope of the article covers the experimental methods needed for the accurate measurement of VCD spectra and the theoretical steps required to systematically deduce absolute configuration. Determination of absolute configuration of a molecule by VCD requires knowledge of its conformation or conformational distribution, and hence VCD analysis necessarily provides solution-state conformation information, in many cases available by no other method, as an additional benefit. Comparisons of the advantages and limitations of VCD relative to other available chiroptical methods of analysis are also presented. Chirality 15: 743 -758, 2003.
Low-J rotational spectra, internal rotation, and structures of several benzene-water dimers
The Journal of chemical …, 1993
Low J (O-4) rotational transitions have been observed for the benzene-water dimer of which high J (>4) transitions were reported recently by Blake [Science 257, 942 ( 1992)]. Our experiments used a modified Balle/Flygare Fourier transform microwave spectrometer, with a pulsed supersonic nozzle as the sample source, and examined a variety of isotopic species in the ground and first excited internal rotor states (m=O and 1). The dimers of the parent C,He benzene with H,O, HDO, DzO, and HZ"0 have symmetric top spectra characteristic of two coaxial rotors with a symmetric top frame and a very low effective V6 barrier. The dimers of HZ0 and D,O with the 13C and D monosubstituted benzenes have asymmetric top spectra of which only the m =O state was assigned. However, doublets in the m = 1, J=O+ 1 transitions show that there is a V, term of -0.5 MHz in their barriers. A substitution analysis was made of the rotational constants found for the m=O state of the dimers with HZ1*O, D20, and the 13C and D monosubstituted benzenes. It shows that the oxygen is at the a axis of the dimer, well outside (0.48 A> the hydrogens. However, the C, axis of the Hz0 is not coincident with the a axis but is at an angle p of 37" to it, rotated so that the two hydrogens are equivalent. The sixfold axis of the benzene corresponds to the a axis, there is little or no tilt ( y) of the benzene. The c.m. (C,H,) to c.m. (H,O) distance R is 3.329 A. The closely spaced hyperfine structure from the proton-proton magnetic dipole interaction and the deuterium quadrupole interaction was resolved for several dimers and transitions, principally J= 0 -+ 1 and 1 + 2. The results demonstrate effective nuclear equivalence in dimers with Hz0 and D,O. Also, the symmetries found for their nuclear spin functions correlate with the lowest rotational levels of free water, the m=O state with 0, and m = 1 with lo, and llt. For the m= 1, K=O transitions of C6H6-HZ0 the correlation is with 1 t1 and for the K= f 1, with lo, . These assignments are reversed for C6H6-D20.