The C1s core levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and styrenic polymers: A first-principles study

Understanding core level shifts in aromatic compounds is crucial for the correct interpretation of x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), including acenes, as well as of styrenic polymers, which are increasingly relevant for the microelectronic industry, among other applications. The effect of delocalization through π aromatic systems on the stabilization of valence molecular orbitals has been widely investigated in the past. However, little has been reported on the impact on the deeper C1s core energy levels. In this work, we use first-principles calculations at the level of many body perturbation theory to compute the C1s binding energies of several aromatic systems. We report a C1s red shift in PAHs and acenes of increasing size, both in the gas phase and in the molecular crystal. C1s red shifts are also calculated for stacked benzene and naphthalene pairs at decreasing intermolecular distances. A C1s red shift is in addition found between oligomers of poly(p-hydroxystyrene) and polystyrene of increasing length, which we attribute to ring-ring interactions between the side-chains. The predicted shifts are larger than common instrumental errors and could, therefore, be detected in XPS experiments.