Assessment of New Meta and Hybrid Meta Density Functionals for Predicting the Geometry and Binding Energy of a Challenging System: The Dimer of H₂S and Benzene

Noncovalent interactions of a hydrogen bond donor with an aromatic pi system present a challenge for density functional theory, and most density functionals do not perform well for this kind of interaction. Here we test seven recent density functionals from our research group, along with the popular B3LYP functional, for the dimer of H 2S with benzene. The functionals considered include the four new meta and hybrid meta density functionals of the M06 suite, three slightly older hybrid meta functionals, and the B3LYP hybrid functional, and they were tested for their abilities to predict the dissociation energies of three conformations of the H 2S-benzene dimer and to reproduce the key geometric parameters of the equilibrium conformation of this dimer. All of the functionals tested except B3LYP correctly predict which of the three conformations of the dimer is the most stable. The functionals that are best able to reproduce the geometry of the equilibrium conformation of the dimer with a polarized triple-zeta basis set are M06-L, PWB6K, and MPWB1K, each having a mean unsigned relative error across the two experimentally verifiable geometric parameters of only 8%. The success of M06-L is very encouraging because it is a local functional, which reduces the cost for large simulations. The M05-2X functional yields the most accurate binding energy of a conformation of the dimer for which a binding energy calculated at the CCSD(T) level of theory is available; M05-2X gives a binding energy for the system with a difference of merely 0.02 kcal/mol from that obtained by the CCSD(T) calculation. The M06 functional performs well in both categories by yielding a good representation of the geometry of the equilibrium structure and by giving a binding energy that is only 0.19 kcal/mol different from that calculated by CCSD(T). We conclude that the new generation of density functionals should be useful for a variety of problems in biochemistry and materials where aromatic functional groups can serve as hydrogen bond acceptors.