Binding energies from diffusion Monte Carlo for the MB-pol H2O and D2O dimer: A comparison to experimental values.

The diffusion Monte Carlo (DMC) method is applied to compute the ground state energies of the water monomer and dimer and their D2O isotopomers using MB-pol; the most recent and most accurate ab inito-based potential energy surface (PES). MB-pol has already demonstrated excellent agreement with high level electronic structure data, as well as agreement with some experimental, spectroscopic, and thermodynamic data. Here, the DMC binding energies of (H2O)2 and (D2O)2 agree with the corresponding values obtained from velocity map imaging within, respectively, 0.01 and 0.02 kcal/mol. This work adds two more valuable data points that highlight the accuracy of the MB-pol PES.