An experimental study of the structural and vibrational properties of sesquiterpene lactone cnicin using FT-IR, FT-Raman, UV-visible and NMR spectroscopies

An experimental and theoretical investigation of cnicin is presented, combining the use of infrared, Raman, NMR and UV-visible spectroscopies with density functional theory (DFT) that employs hybrid B3LYP exchange correlation functional and a 6-31G^* basis set. The molecular electrostatic potentials, atomic charges, bond orders, stabilization energies, topological properties and energy gap are presented by performing NBO, AIM and HOMO-LUMO calculations at the same level of theory as cnicin. A complete vibrational compound assignment was performed by employing internal coordinate analysis and a scaled quantum mechanical force field (SQMFF) methodology. Comparisons between the theoretical and experimental vibrational and ultraviolet-visible spectra show a strong concordance. The geometrical parameters and NBO studies suggest a probable negative Cotton effect for cnicin, which can be attributed to the π → π^* transition for an α,β-unsaturated γ-lactone, as reported in the literature.