Chemical Bonding in the C$_2$ Molecule

Abstract: Bonding in the C$_2$ molecule is investigated with CAS(8,8) wave functions using canonical MOs. In a subsequent step, orthogonal atomic orbitals are constructed by localizing the CASSCF MOs on the two carbon atoms with an orthogonal transformation. This orbital transformation causes an orthogonal transformation of the configuration state functions (CSF) spanning the function space of the singlet ground state of C$_2$. Instead of CSFs built from canonical MOs one gets CSFs of orthogonal deformed atomic orbitals (AO). This approach resembles the orthogonal valence bond methods (OVB) CSFs which are very different from conventional VB, based on non-orthogonal AOs. To get used to the different argumentation, the bonding situation in ethane (single bond), ethene (double bond), and the nitrogen molecule (triple bond) are also studied. The complex bonding situation in C$_2$ is caused by the possibility to excite an electron with spin flip from the doubly occupied 2s AO into the 2p subshell, the resulting high-spin $^5S_u$ state of the carbon atom allows for a better reduction of the Pauli repulsion. But the electron structure around the equilibrium distance does not allow to say that C$_2$ in its ground state has a double, or triple, or even a quadruple bond.