On the prediction of thermal stability of nitroaromatic compounds using quantum chemical calculations

Abstract : This work presents a new approach to predict thermal stability of nitroaromatic compounds based on quantum chemical calculations and on quantitative structure-property relationship (QSPR) methods. The data set consists of 22 nitroaromatic compounds of known decomposition enthalpy (taken as a macroscopic property related to explosibility) obtained from differential scanning calorimetry. Geometric, electronic and energetic descriptors have been selected and computed using density functional theory (DFT) calculation to describe the 22 molecules. First approach consisted in looking at their linear correlations with the experimental decomposition enthalpy. Molecular weight, electrophilicity index, electron affinity and oxygen balance appeared as the most correlated descriptors (respectively R2 = 0.76, 0.75, 0.71 and 0.64). Then multilinear regression was computed with these descriptors. The obtained model is a six-parameter equation containing descriptors all issued from quantum chemical calculations. The prediction is satisfactory with a correlation coefficient R2 of 0.91 and a predictivity coefficient R2(cv) of 0.84 using a cross validation method.