Subject: Summary re term symbols

From: "Wilson, Bruce" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 31 Jan 1997 12:39:27 -0500

Following is the information I received regarding references on
term symbols.  Thanks to Lutfur Khundkar, J. Grant, Ole Swang,
and Richard Bone for their time in responding.  
 
I found both McQuarrie's book and Atkin's book in the library
and have been reading through those.  

----From [email-masked] (Lutfur Khundkar)
Don McQuarrie's "Quantum Chemistry" has an excellent section on naming
and deriving atomic term symbols. The molecular symmetry symbols I
learned from Cotton's book "Chemical Application of Group Theory" as
well as from Herzberg's bible on Molecular spectroscopy. Herzberg's
books are comprehensive, but nowhere as eloquent as McQuarrie's.

-------From [email-masked] (Roland Hertwig)
In principle, Atkins' books suit the purpose. Look for "Physical
Chemistry" 
or even better "Molecular Quantum Mechanics" by P.W. Atkins (OXford
University Press). Also a good book is "Quantum Chemistry" by I.R.A.
Levine.
(Prentice Hall International).

--------From [email-masked] (J. Grant)
The Text "Spectrophotometric Identification of Organic Compounds"
Fifth Edition, by Silverstein, Bassler and Morrill contains a
through chapter (20 pages) with a bibliography (at chapter's end)
that I have found useful.

-----From [email-masked] (Ole Swang)
The following books all treat group theory for molecules:

F. A. Cotton: "Chemical Application of Group Theory"
P. W. Atkins: "Molecular Quantum Mechanics"
F. L. Pilar: "Elementary Quantum Chemistry"

Cotton's book is the classic. The two others are textbooks on quantum
chemistry, with chapters on molecular symmetry.

-----From [email-masked] (Richard Bone)
I'm not sure if you'll have had a  flood of replies about this yet but
two books I found useful in the education system phase of my life were:

P. W. Atkins,  Molecular Quantum Mechanics (Oxford University Press)
M. Gerloch,  Orbitals, Terms and States.

The first one has useful and accurate discussion in places though is not
very expansive.

The second book is a specialist work devoted to the entire subject in
its
minutiae ...

Otherwise, failing that, I always found solid spectroscopy books, e.g.,
by G. Herzberg, to be valuable in these areas.  I wouldn't settle for
any
undergraduate level spectroscopy text book though as it won't be precise
enough or full enough for your aims.

=================================================================
Bruce E. Wilson ([email-masked])
Chemical Information Services, B-150B, Lincoln Street
Eastman Chemical Company
Kingsport, TN  37662-5150
Voice: (423) 229-8886  FAX: (423) 229-6114 

"Opinions are mine, but available free of charge."