POLYSTYRENE MODELS .2. ABINITIO STUDY OF ISOBUTYLBENZENE

The structure and stability of the various conformations of isobutylbenzene are studied using ab initio molecular orbital theory. The calculations show that coupling between the structural units is important. The results indicate that complete geometry optimization of the stable and transition structures of isobutylbenzene produce significant changes in geometrical parameters and charge distributions of this molecule when compared with the corresponding results obtained using the rigid-rotor approximation. These changes are particularly noticeable in one of the gauche conformations and in transition structures of isobutylbenzene generated by the phenyl group rotation. For polystyrene, these results present evidence that there is a strong coupling between the chain-backbone folding and the rotation of the phenyl group. Multidimensional potential energy surfaces are displayed using a topological representation.