A good correlation was obtained between the electronic properties of Cu-doped anatase TiO2 by virtue of both physical chemistry characterization and theoretical calculations. Pure and Cu-doped TiO2 were synthesized. The composition, structural and electronic properties, and the band gap energy were obtained using several techniques. The method of synthesis used produces Cu-doped anatase TiO2, and XRD, XPS and Raman spectroscopy indicate that Cu atoms are incorporated in the structure by substitution of Ti atoms, generating a distortion of the structure and oxygen vacancies. In turn, the band gap energy of the synthesized samples decrease drastically with the Cu doping. Moreover, periodic density functional theory (DFT-periodic) calculations were carried out both to model the experimentally observed doped structures and to understand theoretically the experimental structures obtained, the formation of oxygen vacancies and the values of the band gap energy. From the analysis of density of states (DOS), projected density of states (PDOS) and the electron localization function (ELF) a decrease in the band gap is predicted upon increasing the Cu doping. Thus, the inclusion of Cu in the anatase structure implies a covalent character in the Cu-O interaction, which involves the appearance of new states in the valence band maximum with a narrowing in the band gap.

A new software (UCA-FUKUI) has been developed to facilitate the theoretical study of chemical reactivity. This program can calculate global parameters like hardness, softness, philicities, and Fukui condensed functions, and also local parameters from the condensed functions. To facilitate access to the program we have developed a very easy-to-use interface. We have tested the performance of the software by calculating the global and local reactivity indexes of a group of representative molecules. Finite difference and frontier molecular orbital methods were compared and their correlation tested. Finally, we have extended the analysis to a set of ligands of importance in coordination chemistry, and the results are compared with the exact calculation. As a general trend, our study shows the existence of a high correlation between global parameters, but a weaker correlation between local parameters.

DAMQT-2.1.0 is a new version of DAMQT package which includes topographical analysis of molecular electron density (MED) and molecular electrostatic potential (MESP), such as mapping of critical points (CPs), creating molecular graphs, and atomic basins. Mapping of CPs is assisted with algorithmic determination of Euler characteristic in order to provide a necessary condition for locating all possible CPs. Apart from the mapping of CPs and determination of molecular graphs, the construction of MESP-based atomic basin is a new and exclusive feature introduced in DAMQT-2.1.0. The GUI in DAMQT provides a user-friendly interface to run the code and visualize the final outputs. MPI libraries have been implemented for all the tasks to develop the parallel version of the software. Almost linear scaling of computational time is achieved with the increasing number of processors while performing various aspects of topography. A brief discussion of molecular graph and atomic basin is provided in the current article highlighting their chemical importance. Appropriate example sets have been presented for demonstrating the functions and efficiency of the code.

Nanofluids have emerged as an addition for thermal management and energy conversion applications. The dispersion of a small amount of solid nanoparticles occasionally leads to an unexpected enhancement in the specific heat of the dispersant fluid. This effect has technical, economic, and social significance, and for that, it has received a lot of attention from applied research, but the associated physical and chemical phenomena explaining this phenomenon are yet to be described. We report here a combined experimental and theoretical investigation of nanofluids consisting of palladium nanoplates in a typical heat transfer oil used for concentrating solar power. Their specific heat per unit volume is found to be maximally enhanced at intermediate nanoparticle concentrations, at all temperatures. This is consistent with the phenomenological description provided by the mesolayer model. Density functional theory calculations of adsorption energies and diffusion/desorption activation barriers reveal a strong interaction between the base fluid molecules and palladium surfaces, leading to a nanofluid model where the metal particles are decorated by a static layer of organic molecules. Such layering is potentially responsible for the anomalous enhancement on the thermal properties of the nanofluid, such as the specific heat. Our contribution with this work is a first step toward a complete understanding on the structure and properties of nanofluids using ab initio molecular simulation techniques rather than phenomenological descriptions only.

No abstract