DRC Reaction: Cyclobutene Ring-Opening to form Butadiene (Home)

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  ===>    In this simulation, lasting 1.02ps, cyclobutene ring-opens to form 1,3-butadiene.  At room temperature, this reaction would not occur spontaneously, so the initial conditions included enough energy to allow the reaction to proceed.  At the transition state, all normal modes are unpopulated except the transition mode, which has an energy of 0.3kcal/mol.   This is a dynamic reaction coordinate calculation, modeling the isolated system in a vacuum, so energy is conserved.  This means that although butadiene is formed, there is enough energy in the system that it would eventually go back to cyclobutene, however the wait might be very long! Under normal conditions, the excess energy would be carried away into the surroundings.

For reference: 

 DHf(cyclobutene) = 37.5 kcal/mol
 DHf1,3-butadiene = 26.0 kcal/mol

Data set used by MOPAC:

 irc=-1*  drc t-priority=0.4 cycles=4000 gnorm=0.1
 Cyclobutene -> butadiene

  C         0.00000000 +0    0.0000000 +0    0.0000000 +0                     -0.2711
  C         2.09542702 +1    0.0000000 +0    0.0000000 +0                     -0.2711
  C         1.41235903 +1   74.6911459 +1    0.0000000 +0    2    1    0      -0.1643
  C         1.39536653 +1  102.9147444 +1   14.9750623 +1    3    2    1      -0.1645
  H         1.07961066 +1  121.5806832 +1  141.5488537 +1    1    4    3       0.1329
  H         1.08188876 +1  122.7322763 +1  -58.8561305 +1    1    4    3       0.1527
  H         1.07962359 +1  121.5787713 +1  141.5886061 +1    2    3    4       0.1329
  H         1.08192201 +1  122.7666089 +1  -58.7492900 +1    2    3    4       0.1527
  H         1.07183872 +1  129.4772894 +1  150.2423278 +1    3    4    1       0.1498
  H         1.07184180 +1  129.4782103 +1  150.2141939 +1    4    3    2       0.1498