ABSTRACT:The reaction mechanism and relative stabilities of the intermediates and transition states in the reaction of 1 O plus ethylene molecule using ab initio molecular 2 Ž . orbital MO theories at several levels of theory with the correction of the nondynamic and dynamic electron correlation effects were systematically investigated. showing that the reaction through the 1,4-biradical intermediates initially proceeds through the gauche transition state to form the gauche minimum 1 BR state, following that the free rotation of O moiety occurs due to the energy barrier less than 4.0 2 kcalrmol. The stability of the perepoxide is surprisingly sensitive to the levels of the Ž . theory and the basis sets employed. The coupled-cluster methods, CCSD and CCSD T , gave the reasonable stabilities of 1,4-biradical intermediates, perepoxide, and dioxetane Ž . as a reaction product. From the results of the CCSD and CCSD T methods, the reaction 1 of O q H C CH proceeds by a two-step mechanism through the 1,4-biradical 2 2 2 intermediates rather than through the perepoxide.