Unraveling Anharmonic Effects in the Vibrational Predissociation Spectra of H5O2+ and Its Deuterated Analogues

The nature of anharmonic couplings in the H5O2+ Zundel ion and its deuterated isotopologues is investigated through comparison of their measured and calculated vibrational spectra. This follows a recent study in which we reported spectra for H5O2+, D5O2+, and D4HO2+ from similar to 600 to 4000 cm(-1), as well as H4DO2+ in the OH and OD stretching regions [J. Phys. Chem. B 2008, 112, 321]. While the assignments of the higher-energy transitions associated with the fundamentals of the exterior OH and OD motions are relatively straightforward, difficulties arise in the assignment of the lower-frequency regions that involve displacement of the bridging proton, especially for the isotopically mixed species. Here we revisit the Ar-tagged isotopomers, and report the low energy action spectrum of H4DO2+ for the first time, as well as present significantly improved spectra for the D4HO2+ and D5O2+ systems. Band assignments are clarified in several cases using IR-IR hole-burning. We then investigate the physical origin of the anharmonic effects encoded in these spectra using a recently developed technique in which the anharmonic frequencies and intensities of transitions (involving up to two quanta of excitation) are evaluated using the ground state probability amplitudes [J. Phys. Chem. A 2009, 113, 7346] obtained from diffusion Monte Carlo simulations. This approach has the advantage that it is applicable to low-symmetry systems [such as (HDO)H+(OH2)] that are not readily addressed using highly accurate methods such as the multiconfigurational time-dependent Hartree (MCTDH) approach. Moreover, it naturally accommodates an intuitive evaluation of the types of motion that contribute oscillator strength in the various regions of the spectrum, even when the wave function is intrinsically not separable as a product of low-dimensional approximate solutions. Spectra for H5O2+, D5O2+, H4DO2+, and D4HO2+ that are calculated by this approach are shown to be in excellent agreement with the measured spectra for these species, leading to reassignments of two of the bands in the intramolecular bending region of D4HO2+.