Order in chaos and the dynamics and kinetics of unimolecular conformational isomerization

A high degree of structure and therefore order in chaos is found to exist in the detailed dynamical pathways to conformational isomerization. It is shown that this structure can be used to determine the probabilities associated with the dynamical pathways to reaction, trapping, and back reaction. An earlier publication described the mediation of the dynamics of 3-phospholene by phase space structures we called ‘‘reactive islands’’ (RIS)21. In this paper we extend the physical and mathematical properties of RIS and develop the corresponding kinetic theory. RIS theory is applied to a model of a hindered rotor and 3-phospholene. It is shown that the RIS kinetic model accurately predicts trajectory simulations of conformer population decay. Comparisons with standard RRKM theory are included. A discussion on the extension of RIS theory to quantum reactive dynamics and its relevance to laboratory experiments is also included.