Electrostatic potentials of molecules and prediction of the lewis acid-base properties of solvents, part I. General considerations

Abstract

Electrostatic potentials in the vicinity of isolated molecules of typical nonaqueous solvents were computed in the MNDO approximation. It was found that the calculated dipole moments are in good agreement with experimental values. However, it turned out that in many cases electrostatic interactions of ions with solvent molecules cannot be described in the frame of ion-dipole interactions. Thus, two computable parameters,UN andUP describing short-range electrostatic interactions of a solvent molecule with a cation or an anion of radiusR were proposed. The dependence ofUN andUP uponR is analyzed in the context of ion-solvent interactions.