A computational study of the electron affinity of silene

The electron affinity (EA) of silene, CH2SiH2, is investigated using density functional theory and molecular orbital calculations. EA values of 6.6, 4.1, and 9.0 kcal/mol are calculated at the B3LYP, BLYP, and BP86 levels of theory, respectively, suggesting that the ion is bound with respect to electron detachment in the gas phase. Calculations of the electron binding energy of the triplet state and the singlet–triplet splitting in silene are used to establish a lower limit to the EA of 0.1–0.7 kcal/mol, consistent with the results obtained by direct calculation.