Benchmarking Electronic Excitation Energies and Transitions in Peptide Radicals

Excited electronic states in several radical chromophores representing photochemically active groups in peptide and protein radicals and cation radicals were investigated computationally using equation-of-motion coupled cluster (EOM-CCSD) and time-dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT) methods. The calculations identified the main transitions responsible for photodissociations of gas-phase peptide cation radicals in the near-UV region of the spectrum. Analysis of the EOM-CCSD benchmarks showed that no TD-DFT method was universally accurate across the various radical motifs that included Cα-amide, aminoketyl, formamidyl, guanidyl, carbamyl, benzyl, phenoxy, and tautomeric dihydrophenyl and imidazolyl radicals. Overall, the ωB97XD, M06-2X, and LC-BLYP hybrid functionals showed acceptable performance when benchmarked against EOM-CCSD calculations. However, the performance of these TD-DFT methods depended on the nature of the radical chromophore, emphasizing the need for benchmarking and careful analysis.