New developments in the polarizable continuum model for quantum mechanical and classical calculations on molecules in solution

The polarizable continuum model (PCM), used for the calculation of molecular energies, structures, and properties in liquid solution has been deeply revised, in order to extend its range of applications and to improve its accuracy. The main changes effect the definition of solute cavities, of solvation charges and of the PCM operator added to the molecular Hamiltonian, as well as the calculation of energy gradients, to be used in geometry optimizations. The procedure can be equally applied to quantum mechanical and to classical calculations; as shown also with a number of numerical tests, this PCM formulation is very efficient and reliable. It can also be applied to very large solutes, since all the…