Conical intersections involving the dissociative 1πσ* state in 9H-adenine: a quantum chemical ab initio study

Abstract

The conical intersections of the dissociative ¹πσ* excited state with the lowest ¹ππ* excited state and the electronic ground state of 9H-adenine have been investigated with multireference electronic structure calculations. Adiabatic and quasidiabatic potential energy surfaces and coupling elements were calculated as a function of the NH stretch coordinate of the azine group and the out-of-plane angle of the hydrogen atom, employing MultiReference Configuration-Interaction (MRCI) as well as Complete-Active-Space Self-Consistent-Field (CASSCF) methods. Characteristic properties of the ¹ππ*–¹πσ* and ¹πσ*–S₀ conical intersections, such as the diabatic-to-adiabatic mixing angle, the geometric phase of the adiabatic electronic wavefunctions, the derivative coupling, as well as adiabatic and diabatic transition dipole moment surfaces were investigated in detail. These data are a prerequisite for future quantum wavepacket simulations of the photodissociation and internal-conversion dynamics of adenine.