Recent experiments have revealed the profound effect
of strong
light–matter interactions in optical cavities on the electronic
ground state of molecular systems. This phenomenon, known as vibrational
strong coupling, can modify reaction rates and induce the formation
of molecular vibrational polaritons, hybrid states involving both
photon modes, and vibrational modes of molecules. We present an ab
initio methodology based on the cavity Born–Oppenheimer Hartree–Fock
ansatz, which is specifically powerful for ensembles of molecules,
to calculate vibro-polaritonic IR spectra. This method allows for
a comprehensive analysis of these hybrid states. Our semiclassical
approach, validated against full quantum simulations, reproduces key
features of the vibro-polaritonic spectra. The underlying analytic
gradients also allow for optimization of cavity-coupled molecular
systems and performing semiclassical dynamics simulations.