  The present study of small molecules containing silicon has been motivated by
(a) the considerable interest being shown currently in the kinetics and
reactivity of such molecules, and (b) the biotechnological potential of
silicon-derivate surfaces as substrates in the adsorption of, for instance,
amino acids and proteins. Therefore, we have studied by (i) a semi-empirical
approach and (ii) an ab initio procedure employing low-order Moller-Plesset
perturbation theory, the molecular correlation energies of some neutral closed
and open shell silicon-containing molecules in the series SiXnYm. Procedure (i)
is shown to have particular merit for the correlation of the ionic members
studied in the above series, while the ab initio procedures employed come into
their own for neutral species.
