Theoretical Study of Negative Molecular Ions

Although this review provides references to tabulations of molecular electron affinities, primarily it focuses on explaining why theory plays an important role in understanding the behavior of anions, explaining the challenges that anions pose to theory, making connections between the theories used to compute electron affinities and the potentials (e.g., charge-dipole, charge-quadrupole, valence attraction and exchange repulsion, dispersion, and polarization) that govern the electron-molecule interaction, and discussing how species with negative electron affinities may possess metastable anion states and how such states should be treated. In addition to references to published literature, many links are given to websites of practicing theoretical chemists who study molecular anions; these links (which appear in boldface) offer the reader a broad avenue to access much more information about molecular anions than can be covered in a review or even through conventional literature sources.