Reassessment of the Mechanisms of Thermal C-H Bond Activation of Methane by Cationic Magnesium Oxides: A Critical Evaluation of the Suitability of Different Density Functionals.

Abstract

The mechanisms of the thermal reactions of the two iconic magnesium oxide cations MgO.+ and Mg2 O2.+ with methane have been re-evaluated at the CCSD(T)/CBS//CCSD/def2-TZVP level of theory. For the reaction of MgO.+ with CH4 , only the classical hydrogen-atom transfer (HAT) was found; in contrast, for the Mg2 O2.+ /CH4 couple, both HAT and proton-coupled electron-transfer (PCET) exist as mechanistic variants. In order to evaluate the suitability of density functional theory (DFT) methods, the reactions were computed by using 27 density functionals. The results obtained demonstrate that the various DFT methods often deliver rather different results for both geometric and energetic features. As to the prediction of the apparent barriers, pure functionals give the largest mean absolute errors. BMK, ωB97XD, and the double-hybrid functional mPW2PLYP were confirmed to come closest to the results provided by CCSD(T)/CBS. Thus, mechanistic conclusions based on a single DFT method should be viewed with great caution. In summary, this study may assist in the selection of a suitable quantum chemical method to unravel the mechanistic details of C-H bond activation by charged metal oxides.