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Computational study of IR, Raman, and NMR spectra of 4-methylmethcathinone drug

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Abstract

Molecular electronic structure, IR, UV, and NMR spectra of the most popular cathinone, known as mephedrone or 4-methylmethcathinone (4-MMC), is studied thoroughly by quantum chemical calculation in terms of the density functional theory (DFT). Geometry optimization of 4-MMC and its hydrochloride complex is performed with the B3LYP functional, and all vibrational frequencies are analyzed in all details. On this background, the IR and Raman spectra are interpreted. The importance of low-frequency terahertz and Raman spectra is stressed for distinguishing of various MMC isomers. The UV spectrum is calculated by time-dependent DFT method which allows complete interpretation of intense absorption bands at 270 and 210 nm as combinations of various ππ*, nπ*, and charge transfer excitations in amino-phenyl moieties. Very informative analysis of UV absorption and NMR spectra provides useful details on the structure-activity relationship for mephedrone molecule.

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Data availability

All experimental studies of the illegal 4-MMC drug sample were performed in the Scientific Research Forensic Center of Cherkasy. The structures of the studied 4-methylmethcathinone (4-MMC) molecule and its salt, 4-methylmethcathinone hydrochloride (4-MMC∙HCl), have been optimized at the DFT level using the B3LYP/6–311++G(d,p) method starting from the initial molecular geometries obtained by the PM3 approach. All other experimental data are taken from articles.

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Code availability

The quantum chemical calculations were performed with computational resources provided by the High Performance Computing Center North (HPC2N) in Umeå, Sweden, through the project “Multiphysics Modeling of Molecular Materials” SNIC 2019/2–41.

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine (project no 0118 U003862). The calculations were supported by the Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing (SNIC) and were performed at the Parallel Data Center (PDC) within the project “Multiphysical Simulation of Molecular Materials” SNIC 020/11-23.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Bohdan Khmelnytsky National University, Cherkasy, 18031, Ukraine

    Valentina Minaeva, Boris Minaev & Alexander Panchenko

  2. Cherkasy Scientific Research Forensic Center of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, Cherkasy, 18009, Ukraine

    Vyacheslav Pasychnik

Authors
  1. Valentina Minaeva
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  2. Boris Minaev
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  3. Alexander Panchenko
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  4. Vyacheslav Pasychnik
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Contributions

Most of the work on this article was done by Dr. Valentina Minaeva. She performed all the interpretation and analysis of the spectra. Boris Minaev carried out a detailed analysis of quantum chemical calculations. Alexander Panchenko was engaged in DFT calculation and the preparation of tables, figures, and article design for publication. Vyacheslav Pasychnik provided the experimental data of the spectra and added some comments to the discussion of the results.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alexander Panchenko.

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Highlights

1. DFT calculation of gaseous 4-methylmethcathinone and its hydrochloride complex in solid phase are presented.

2. Electronic and vibrational parameters are compared with the known IR and NMR spectra.

3. IR and UV spectra of the illegal sample are interpreted.

4. Importance of THz domain for drug analysis is stressed.

5. DFT calculations allow to assign the whole set of spectral signals of 4-MMC drug.

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Minaeva, V., Minaev, B., Panchenko, A. et al. Computational study of IR, Raman, and NMR spectra of 4-methylmethcathinone drug. J Mol Model 27, 3 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00894-020-04658-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00894-020-04658-0

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