CNDO/2

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CNDO is the abbreviation for Complete Neglect of Differential Overlap. Although CNDO is based on quantum chemistry, it is a semiempirical method using two approximations:

core approximation - only the outer valence electrons are explicitly included.
zero-differential overlap

CNDO/2 is the main version of CNDO. The method was first introduced by John Pople.

1 Background
2 Methodology
3 See also
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Background

An earlier method was Extended Huckel method, which expicitly ignores electron-electron repulsion terms. It was a method for calculating the electronic energy and the molecular orbitals. CNDO/1 and CNDO/2 were developed from this method by explicitly including the electron-electron repulsion terms, but neglecting many of them, approximating some of them and fitting others to experimental data from spectroscopy.

The predominant theory about matter at the atomic and molecular scale is quantum mechanics. Molecular geometry is a field concerning how molecules occupy a volume of space and have a certain distribution of charge in this volume.

[edit] Methodology

Quantum mechanics provides equations that CNDO uses to model atoms and their locations. These equations are solved iteratively to the point where the results do not vary significantly between two iterations. It is noteworthy that CNDO does not involve knowledge about chemical bonds but instead uses knowledge about quantum wavefunctions.

CNDO can be used for both closed shell molecules, where the electrons are fully paired in molecular orbitals and open shell molecules, which are radicals with unpaired electrons.

CNDO is considered to yield good results about partial atomic charge and dipole moment. Total energy and binding energy are calculated. Eigenvalues for calculating the highest occupied molecular orbital and lowest unoccupied molecular orbital are reported from the closed shell approach.