Noncovalent Interactions in Supramolecular Complexes: A Study on Corannulene and the Double Concave Buckycatcher

Stimulated by the recent observation of π-π interactions between C60 and corannulene subunits in a molecular tweezer arrangement (J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2007, 129, 3842), a density functional theory study was performed to analyze the electronic structure and properties of various noncovalent corannulene complexes. The theoretical approach is first applied to corannulene complexes with a series of benchmark molecules (CH4, NH3, and H2O) using several new-generation density functionals. The performance of nine density functionals, illustrated by computing binding energies of the corannulene complexes, demonstrates that Zhao and Truhlar's MPWB1K and M05-2X functionals provide energies similar to that obtained at the SCS-MP2 level. In contrast, most of the other popular density functionals fail to describe this noncovalent interaction or yield purely repulsive interactions. Further investigations with the M05-2X functional show that the binding energy of C60 with corannulene subunits in the relaxed molecular receptor clip geometry is -20.67 kcal/mol. The results of this calculation further support the experimental interpretation of pure π-π interactions between a convex fullerene and the concave surfaces of two corannulene subunits.

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