Pseudo Jahn-Teller origin of puckering in cyclohexahomoatomic molecules E6 (E = S, Se, Te) and restoring S6 planar ring configuration

Abstract

The pseudo Jahn-Teller effect (PJTE) is employed to explore the origin of the puckering structure of cyclohexasulfur (S6), cyclohexaselenium (Se6) and cyclohexatellurium (Te6) and their nondegenerate and degenerate vibronic excited states and their planar structure instabilities have investigated. The ab initio geometry optimization and frequency calculations show that all these cyclohexahomoatomic molecules chose D6h symmetry in the planar configuration, and according the S6 and Se6 experimental structure, the chair form of the molecules is stable structure. The vibronic coupling between the ground state 1A1g and excited state 1B2g is the cause of chair puckering in all these series compounds and the numerical solutions of the PJTE (1A1g+1B2g)⊗b2g problems describe their instability. The adiabatic potential energy surfaces (APES) cross sections of low-lying electronic states along the b2g puckering normal coordinates have calculated by the state-average complete active space self-consistent field (SA-CASSCF) method. The calculation results show that, the chair puckering instability in the S6 from unstable planar configuration with D6h symmetry to a stable D3d distorted geometry, is stronger than others, whereas it is weaker in Te6. Additionally, coordination two canions (X = H+, He2+) to the S6 chair structure restore the planarity of S6 puckered ring in the S6X2 systems, although the D6h symmetry in S6 planar ring configuration changes to the Cs symmetry in the systems.