Molecular structure, spectroscopic and DFT computational studies on 4,5-bis(tert-butylsulfanyl)phthalonitrile

•The spectroscopic properties of the compound were investigated by DFT method.•The DFT theoretical results were compared experimental results.•The DFT calculations of the compound, MEP, NLO and FMO properties were also examined.

The molecular geometry, vibrational frequencies and gauge including atomic orbital (GIAO) 1H and 13C NMR chemical shift values of 4,5-bis(tert-butylsulfanyl)phthalonitrile in the ground state were calculated using the density functional method (B3LYP) with 6-311++G(d,p) basis set. The calculated results show that the optimized geometry can well reproduce the crystal structure, and the theoretical vibrational frequencies and chemical shift values show good agreement with experimental values. To investigate the NLO properties of the title compound, the electric dipole moment (μ), the polarizability (α) and the first hyperpolarizability (β) were calculated using the density functional B3LYP method with the 6-311++G(d,p) basis set. For the results, the title compound shows nonzero (β) value revealing second order NLO behavior. The molecular electrostatic potential (MEP) at the B3LYP/6-311++G(d,p) basis optimized geometry has also been calculated to predict reactive sites for electrophilic or nucleophilic attack for the title compound.

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