Angewandte Chemie has published a rather unusual short article – an appeal by Roald Hoffmann, Paul Schleyer and Fritz Schaefer (the latter two were interviewed in my book!) to use “more realism, please!”1
These noted computational chemists suggest that we all have been sloppy in the language we use in describing our computations. They first take on the term “stable”, and rightfully point out that this is a very contextual term – stable where? on my desktop? In a 1M aqueous solution? Inside a helium glove box? Inside a mass spectrometer? In an interstellar cloud? Stable for how long? Indefinitely? For a day? For a day in the humid weather of San Antonio? Or a day inside a cold refrigerator? Or how about inside a Ne matrix? Or for the time it takes to run a picosecond laser experiment?
The authors offer up the terms “viable” and “fleeting” as reasonable alternatives and proscribe a protocol for meeting the condition of “viable” – and I must note that this protocol is very demanding, likely beyond the computational abilities of many labs and certainly beyond what can be done for a reasonably large molecule.
They also take on the uncertainty of computed results, pointing out the likely largely overlooked irreproducibility of many DFT results, due to size difference of the computed grids, difference in implementation of the supposedly same functional, etc. They conclude with a discussion of how many significant figures one should employ.
None of this is earth-shattering, and most is really well-known yet often neglected or overlooked. In another interesting publication treat in this issue, four referee reports of the article are reproduced. The first, by Gernot Frenking,2 argues exactly this point – that the lack of new information, and the sort of whimsical literary approach make the article unacceptable for publication. The other three referees disagree,3-5 and note that though the article is not novel, the authors forcefully remind us that better behaviors should be put into practice.
The article is a nice reminder that careful studies should be carefully reported. (And both the authors of the article and the referees note that these same comments apply to our experimental colleagues, too.)
References
(1) Hoffmann, R.; Schleyer, P. v. R.; Schaefer III, H. F., “Predicting Molecules – More Realism, Please!,” Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2008, 47, 7164-7167, DOI: 10.1002/anie.200801206.
(2) Frenking, G., “No Important Suggestions,” Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2008, 47, 7168-7169, doi: 10.1002/anie.200802500.
(3) Koch, W., “Excellent, Valuable, and Entertaining,” Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2008, 47, 7170, DOI: 10.1002/anie.200802996.
(4) Reiher, M., “Important for the Definition of Terminology in Computational Chemistry,” Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2008, 48, 7171, DOI: 10.1002/anie.200802506.
(5) Bickelhaupt, F. M., “Attractive and Convincing,” Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 2008, 47, 7172, DOI: 10.1002/anie.200802330.
Chris Cramer responded on 11 Nov 2008 at 4:20 pm #
Without wishing any disrespect to Roald, Paul, or Fritz, only Gernot had the perspicacity to note that the Emperor was without clothes in this case. His comment that he felt as though he had been seated in a posh restaurant and then been served thin soup was right on the mark. I was frankly surprised by the favorable comments of the other three referees (I gave Markus a pass, though, for being still too young to be sufficiently jaded).