THE GENERATOR-COORDINATE METHOD FOR A REACTION COORDINATE COUPLED TO A HARMONIC-OSCILLATOR BATH

This paper investigates the usefulness of the generator coordinate met hod (GCM) for treating the dynamics of a reaction coordinate coupled t o a bath of harmonic degrees of freedom. Models for the unimolecular d issociation and isomerization process (proton transfer) are analyzed. The GCM results, presented in analytical form, provide a very good des cription and are compared to other methods Like the basis set method a nd multiconfiguration time dependent self-consistent field. (C) 1998 A merican Institute of Physics. [S0021-9606(98)50934-8].