Nuclear quadrupole coupling in chloroform and calibration of ab initio calculations

The complex hyperfine structures in the J = 1 ← 0, and J = 2 ← 1 ground state rotational transitions of 35Cl3CH and 35Cl237ClCH were resolved and measured at conditions of supersonic expansion. Accurate spectroscopic constants for the two isotopomers have been derived from global fits of the hyperfine structure together with hyperfine-free high-J millimetre wave data. The complete inertial and principal quadrupole tensors of the chlorine nuclei have been determined, and the symmetric top treatment for 35Cl3CH and the asymmetric top treatment for 35Cl237ClCH yield identical results for the principal tensor components of the 35Cl nucleus. The availability of precise experimental splitting constants for many molecules allows benchmarking of ab initio field gradient calculations, and it is found that for the chlorine nucleus optimum predictive performance for molecules of moderate size is obtained at the B3LYP/aug-cc-pVDZ level by using a scaling factor of 1.0619(23).