A comparison of ab initio quantum-mechanical and experimental D0 binding energies of eleven H-bonded and eleven...

Dissociation energies (D0) of 11 H-bonded and 11 dispersion-bound complexes were calculated as the sum of interaction energies and the change of zero-point vibrational energies (ΔZPVE). The structures of H-bonded complexes were optimized at the RI-MP2/cc-pVTZ level, at which deformation and harmonic ΔZPVE energies were also calculated. The structures of dispersion-bound complexes were optimized at the DFT-D3 level, and harmonic ΔZPVE energies were determined at the same level as well. For comparison, CCSD(T)/CBS D0 energies were also evaluated for both types of complexes. The CCSD(T)/CBS interaction energy was constructed as the sum of MP2/CBS interaction energy, extrapolated from aug-cc-pVTZ and aug-cc-pVQZ basis sets, and ΔCCSD(T) correction, determined with the aug-cc-pVDZ basis set. The ΔZPVE energies were determined for all complexes at the harmonic level and for selected complexes, these energies were also calculated using second-order vibration perturbation (VPT2) theory. For H-bonded complexes, the harmonic CCSD(T)/CBS D0 energies were in better agreement with the experimental values (with a mean relative error (MRE) of 6.2%) than the RI-MP2/cc-pVTZ D0 (a MRE of 12.3%). The same trend was found for dispersion-bound complexes (6.2% (MRE) at CCSD(T)/CBS and 7.7% (MRE) at the DFT-D3 level). When the anharmonic ΔZPVE term was included instead of harmonic one, the agreement between theoretical and experimental D0 deteriorated for H-bonded as well as dispersion-bound complexes. Finally, the applicability of "diagonal approximation" for determining the anharmonic ΔZPVE was shown. For the phenolH2O complex, the ΔZPVE energy calculated at the VPT2 level and on the basis of "diagonal approximation" differed by less than 0.1 kcal mol(-1).