Rate coefficients and kinetic isotope effects of the abstraction reaction of H atoms from methylsilane

Thermal rate constants for chemical reactions using improved canonical variational transition state theory (ICVT) with small-curvature tunnelling (SCT) contributions in a temperature range 180-2000 K are reported. The general procedure is used with high-quality ab initio computations and semi-classical reaction probabilities along the minimum energy path (MEP). The approach is based on a vibrational adiabatic reaction path and is applied to the multiple-channel hydrogen abstraction reaction H + SiH3CH3 -> products and its isotopically substituted variants. All the degrees of freedom are optimised and harmonic vibrational frequencies and zero-point energies are calculated at the MP2 level with the cc-pVTZ basis set. Single-point energies are calculated at a higher level of theory; CCSD(T)-F12a/VTZ-F12. ICVT/SCT rate constants show that the quantum tunnelling contributions at low temperatures are relatively important and the H-abstraction channel from SiH3 group of SiH3CH3 is the major pathway. The total rate constants are given by the following expression: k(tot) (ICVT/SCT) = 2.29 10(-18) T-2.42 exp(-350.9/T) cm(3) mole c(-1) s(-1). These calculated rates are in agreement with the available experiments. The ICVT/SCT method is further exploited to predict primary and secondary kinetic isotope effects, respectively). [GRAPHICS] .