Detecting weak interactions between Au- and gas molecules: a photoelectron spectroscopic and ab initio study

Yi Gao; Wei Huang; Jeffrey Woodford; Lai-Sheng Wang; Xiao Cheng Zeng

doi:10.1021/ja903043d

Detecting weak interactions between Au- and gas molecules: a photoelectron spectroscopic and ab initio study

J Am Chem Soc. 2009 Jul 15;131(27):9484-5. doi: 10.1021/ja903043d.

Authors

Yi Gao¹, Wei Huang, Jeffrey Woodford, Lai-Sheng Wang, Xiao Cheng Zeng

Affiliation

¹ Department of Chemistry, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska 68588, USA.

PMID: 19537810
DOI: 10.1021/ja903043d

Abstract

We show that anion photoelectron spectroscopy can be a very sensitive probe for weak intermolecular interactions between gold anion and a noble-gas atom or other nonreactive molecule. High-level ab initio calculations support the measured trend of relatively weak intermolecular interactions among various gold anion-atom complexes. The interaction between Au(-) and H(2)O is much stronger, comparable to a strong hydrogen bond. The interaction between Au(-) and O(2) is weaker than that between Au(-) and a noble-gas atom (Ar, Kr, or Xe).