The collision induced dissociation of formamide-Ca(2+) complexes produced in the gas phase through nanoelectrospray ionization yields as main products ions [CaOH](+), [HCNH](+), [Ca(NH(2))](+), HCO(+) and [Ca(NH(3))](2+) and possibly [Ca(H(2)O)](2+) and [C,O,Ca](2+), the latter being rather minor. The mechanisms behind these fragmentation processes have been established by analyzing the topology of the potential energy surface by means of B3LYP calculations carried out with a core-correlated cc-pWCVTZ basis set. The Ca(2+) complexes formed by formamide itself and formimidic acid play a fundamental role. The former undergoes a charge separation reaction yielding [Ca(NH(2))](+) + HCO(+), and the latter undergoes the most favorable Coulomb explosion yielding [Ca-OH](+) + [HCNH](+) and is the origin of a multistep mechanism which accounts for the observed loss of water and HCN. Conversely, the other isomer of formamide, amino(hydroxyl)carbene, does not play any significant role in the unimolecular reactivity of the doubly charged molecular cation.

The interactions between formamide, which can be considered a prototype of a peptide function, and Sr(2+) have been investigated by combining nanoelectrospray ionization/mass spectrometry techniques and G96LYP DFT calculations. For Sr an extended LANL2DZ basis set was employed, together with a 6-311+G(3df,2p) basis set expansion for the remaining atoms of the system. The observed reactivity seems to be dominated by the Coulomb explosion process yielding [SrOH](+) + [HNCH](+), which are the most intense peaks in the MS/MS spectra. Nevertheless, additional peaks corresponding to the loss of HNC and CO indicate that the association of Sr(2+) to water or to ammonia leads to long-lived doubly charged species detectable in the timescale of these experimental techniques. The topology of the calculated potential energy surface permits us to establish the mechanisms behind these processes. Although the interaction between the neutral base and Sr(2+) is essentially electrostatic, the polarization triggered by the doubly charged metal ion results in the activation of several bonds, and favors different proton transfer mechanisms required for the formation of the [SrOH](+), [SrOH(2)](2+) and [SrNH(3)](2+) products.

No abstract

An assessment of different density functionals and basis sets in describing the binding of Sr 2+ to bases which contain first and second row atoms as active sites has been performed. CCSD(T) calculations using a very large polarized QZ basis set were used as a reference. A total of 12 different functionals have been considered in our assessment. The G96LYP or O3LYP functionals when associated with an enlarged LANLDZ basis set for Sr, including d and f polarization functions and sp diffuse functions, and a 6-311+G(3df,2p) basis set for the remaining atoms, yield Sr 2+ binding energies in fairly good agreement with the CCSD(T)/PQZ reference calculations.

The fragmentation mechanisms of prototypical disaccharides have been studied herein by coupling tandem mass spectrometry (MS) with collisional chemical dynamics simulations. These calculations were performed by explicitly considering the collisions between the protonated sugar and the neutral target gas, which led to an ensemble of trajectories for each system, from which it was possible to obtain reaction products and mechanisms without pre‐imposing them. The β‐aminoethyl and aminopropyl derivatives of cellobiose, maltose, and gentiobiose were studied to observe differences in both the stereochemistry and the location of the glycosidic linkage. Chemical dynamics simulations of MS/MS and MS/MS/MS were used to suggest some primary and secondary fragmentation mechanisms for some experimentally observed product ions. These simulations provided some new insights into the fundamentals of the unimolecular dissociation of protonated sugars under collisional induced dissociation conditions.