A velocity map ion-imaging study on ketene photodissociation at 208 and 213 nm: Rotational dependence of product angular anisotropy

Photodissociation dynamics of ketene following excitation at 208.59 and 213.24 nm have been investigated using the velocity map ion-imaging method. Both the angular distribution and translational energy distribution of the CO products at different rotational and vibrational states have been obtained. No significant difference in the translational energy distributions for different CO rotational state products has been observed at both excitation wavelengths. The anisotropy parameter beta is, however, noticeably different for different CO rotational state products at both excitation wavelengths. For lower rotational states of the CO product, beta is smaller than zero, while beta is larger than zero for CO at higher rotational states. The observed rotational dependence of angular anisotropy is interpreted as the dynamical influence of a peculiar conical intersection between the (1)B(1) excited state and (1)A(2) state along the C(S)-I coordinate.     

Internal state distributions of fragment HCO via S0 and T1 pathways of glyoxal after photolysis in the ultraviolet region

The dynamics of photodissociation of glyoxal (HOC-COH) near the dissociation threshold on the triplet manifold are studied through measurement of distributions of nascent fragment HCO in various internal states. Three rotational levels 1(01) (*), 4(13) (*), and 3(21) (*)+3(22) (*) of vibrational state U (excitation wavelength approximately 394.4 nm, origin at 25,331.865 cm(-1)) of glyoxal in state A (1)A(u) and two other vibrational states at excitation wavelengths 390.33 and 382.65 nm are selected to produce fragment HCO. By means of fluorescence in the transition B (2)A(')-X (2)A(') of HCO, we determined the relative populations of internal states of that fragment. Rotational states of product HCO up to N=26 and K=2 are populated, and bimodal distributions of these rotational states are observed for the photolysis wavelengths used in this work. The high rotational part of the distribution with average energy near values calculated on the basis of the statistical model-phase-space theory is assigned to arise from glyoxal on its S(0) surface, and the low rotational part from the T(1) surface with an exit barrier. After photolysis near the threshold region on the triplet surface, HCO arising from the T(1) state appears to be a major component of products because these rotational levels 1(01) (*), 4(13) (*), and 3(2) (*) of U state selected are gateway states with an enhanced rate of intersystem crossing.     

Quasi-classical trajectory calculations analyzing the dynamics of the C-H stretch mode excitation in the H+CHD3 reaction

A state-to-state dynamics study was performed at a collision energy of 1.53 eV to analyze the effect of the C-H stretch mode excitation on the dynamics of the gas-phase H+CHD3 reaction, which can evolve along two channels, H-abstraction, CD3+H2, and D-abstraction, CHD2+HD. Quasi-classical trajectory calculations were performed on an analytical potential energy surface constructed previously by our group. First, strong coupling between different vibrational modes in the entry channel was observed; i.e., the reaction is non-adiabatic. Second, we found that the C-H stretch mode excitation has little influence on the product rotational distributions for both channels, and on the vibrational distribution for the CD3+H2 channel. However, it has significant influence on the product vibrational distribution for the CHD2+HD channel, where the C-H stretch excitation is maintained in the products, i.e., the reaction shows mode selectivity, reproducing the experimental evidence. Third, the C-H stretch excitation by one quantum increases the reactivity of the vibrational ground-state, in agreement with experiment. Fourth, the state-to-state angular distributions of the CD3 and CHD2 products are reported, finding that for the reactant ground-state the products are practically sideways, whereas the C-H excitation yields a more forward scattering.     

Information-theoretic analysis of quantum mechanical reaction cross sections

Information theory is used to analyze quantum mechanical rotation excitation probabilities for the hydrogen exchange reaction. A linear rotational surprisal is found, and the entropy deficiency of the product rotational distribution is computed.     

OH fragment from benzoic acid monomer photolysis: threshold and product state distribution

Photodissociation dynamics of benzoic acid monomer (BAM) at different ultraviolet excitation wavelengths (280-295 nm) has been investigated. The nascent OH product state distributions were measured using the laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) technique. The rotational state distributions, the Lambda-doublet-state ratio, and spin-orbit state distributions of the OH fragment were also measured at 280-294 nm. The OH fragments are vibrationally cold, and their rotational state distributions are peaked at J' = 3.5 at each photolysis wavelength. No LIF signal of OH fragments was observed at 295 nm. The photodissociation threshold is determined to be 102.5-103.9 kcal/mol for OH channel. The dissociative state and mechanism have been discussed for OH produced from the photodissociation of BAM.     

Effect of the excitation energy on the (HI)2 nonadiabatic photodissociation dynamics

The effect of the excitation energy on the nonadiabatic photodissociation dynamics of (HI)2 is explored in this work. A wave packet model is applied that simulates the photodissociation process starting from the I*-HI complex left behind after dissociation of the first HI moiety within (HI)2. The probability and product fragment state distributions of the different photodissociation pathways are analyzed in a wide range of excitation energies of the I*-HI absorption spectrum. It is found that the probability of electronically nonadiabatic transitions increases substantially (by a factor larger than two) in the range of excitation energies analyzed. This increase is due to an enhancement of the intensity of the spin-rotation coupling responsible for the nonadiabatic transitions with increasing excitation energy. A remarkably high fraction of bound, highly excited I2 photoproducts, slowly decreasing as the excitation energy increases, is also found over the range of energies studied. The I2 product state distributions show manifestations of rotational interference effects and also of rotational cooling in the case of the I2 state distributions produced upon nonadiabatic transitions. Such effects become more pronounced with increasing energy. Experimental implications of these findings are discussed.     

Cl+HD反应产物的极化与态分布

利用准经典轨线理论,在BW2和G3两个势能面上,研究了Cl+HD反应的动力学.计算结果表明,产物的转动取向对势能面及反应体系的质量因子非常敏感.在BW2势能面上,计算的两个产物的转动取向强于在G3势能面上计算的结果,而无论是在BW2势能面上还是在G3势能面上,DCl产物的取向都强于HCl产物的取向.计算结果还表明,在不同的势能面上反应物的转动激发对反应的影响有着显著的不同.在BW2势能面上,反应物的初始转动激发有利于Cl+HD反应的进行;而在G3势能面上,反应物的初始转动激发消弱了反应的反应性.     

A classical trajectory study of the photodissociation of T1 acetaldehyde: the transition from impulsive to statistical dynamics

Previous experimental and theoretical studies of the radical dissociation channel of T(1) acetaldehyde show conflicting behavior in the HCO and CH(3) product distributions. To resolve these conflicts, a full-dimensional potential-energy surface for the dissociation of CH(3)CHO into HCO and CH(3) fragments over the barrier on the T(1) surface is developed based on RO-CCSD(T)/cc-pVTZ(DZ) ab initio calculations. 20,000 classical trajectories are calculated on this surface at each of five initial excess energies, spanning the excitation energies used in previous experimental studies, and translational, vibrational, and rotational distributions of the radical products are determined. For excess energies near the dissociation threshold, both the HCO and CH(3) products are vibrationally cold; there is a small amount of HCO rotational excitation and little CH(3) rotational excitation, and the reaction energy is partitioned dominantly (>90% at threshold) into relative translational motion. Close to threshold the HCO and CH(3) rotational distributions are symmetrically shaped, resembling a Gaussian function, in agreement with observed experimental HCO rotational distributions. As the excess energy increases the calculated HCO and CH(3) rotational distributions are observed to change from a Gaussian shape at threshold to one more resembling a Boltzmann distribution, a behavior also seen by various experimental groups. Thus the distribution of energy in these rotational degrees of freedom is observed to change from nonstatistical to apparently statistical, as excess energy increases. As the energy above threshold increases all the internal and external degrees of freedom are observed to gain population at a similar rate, broadly consistent with equipartitioning of the available energy at the transition state. These observations generally support the practice of separating the reaction dynamics into two reservoirs: an impulsive reservoir, fed by the exit channel dynamics, and a statistical reservoir, supported by the random distribution of excess energy above the barrier. The HCO rotation, however, is favored by approximately a factor of 3 over the statistical prediction. Thus, at sufficiently high excess energies, although the HCO rotational distribution may be considered statistical, the partitioning of energy into HCO rotation is not.     

Excited electronic state decomposition of furazan based energetic materials: 3,3'-diamino-4,4'-azoxyfurazan and its model systems, diaminofurazan and furazan

We report the first experimental and theoretical study of gas phase excited electronic state decomposition of a furazan based, high nitrogen content energetic material, 3,3'-diamino-4,4'-azoxyfurazan (DAAF), and its model systems, diaminofurazan (DAF) and furazan (C2H2N2O). DAAF has received major attention as an insensitive high energy explosive; however, the mechanism and dynamics of the decomposition of this material are not clear yet. In order to understand the initial decomposition mechanism of DAAF and those of its model systems, nanosecond energy resolved and femtosecond time resolved spectroscopies and complete active space self-consistent field (CASSCF) calculations have been employed to investigate the excited electronic state decomposition of these materials. The NO molecule is observed as an initial decomposition product from DAAF and its model systems at three UV excitation wavelengths (226, 236, and 248 nm) with a pulse duration of 8 ns. Energies of the three excitation wavelengths coincide with the (0-0), (0-1), and (0-2) vibronic bands of the NO A 2Sigma+<--X 2Pi electronic transition, respectively. A unique excitation wavelength independent dissociation channel is observed for DAAF, which generates the NO product with a rotationally cold (20 K) and a vibrationally hot (1265 K) distribution. On the contrary, excitation wavelength dependent dissociation channels are observed for the model systems, which generate the NO product with both rotationally cold and hot distributions depending on the excitation wavelengths. Potential energy surface calculations at the CASSCF level of theory illustrates that two conical intersections between the excited and ground electronic states are involved in two different excitation wavelength dependent dissociation channels for the model systems. Femtosecond pump-probe experiments at 226 nm reveal that the NO molecule is still the main observed decomposition product from the materials of interest and that the formation dynamics of the NO product is faster than 180 fs. Two additional fragments are observed from furazan with mass of 40 amu (C2H2N) and 28 amu (CH2N) employing femtosecond laser ionization. This observation suggests a five-membered heterocyclic furazan ring opening mechanism with rupture of a CN and a NO bond, yielding NO as a major decomposition product. NH2 is not observed as a secondary decomposition product of DAAF and DAF.     

Photodissociation dynamics of the Kr-HBr cluster: the effect of the rare gas atom substitution

The ultraviolet photolysis dynamics of Kr-HBr(v=0) is investigated by means of wave packet calculations, focusing on the fragmentation pathway Kr-HBr+ variant Planck's over 2pi omega-->H+Kr-Br. Photolysis is simulated by starting from two different cluster initial states, namely the ground van der Waals (vdW) and an excited vdW bending state, associated with the Kr-H-Br and Kr-Br-H isomers, respectively. The results show that, for the two initial states of the cluster, the Kr-Br product yield is lower than that of Ar-Br radicals found in previous studies on Ar-HBr photolysis. Despite this decrease, the Kr-Br yield is found to be still rather high, in particular for the initial excited vdW state of Kr-HBr(v=0). In addition, the Kr-Br product state distributions exhibit a remarkably higher excitation (mainly rotational) than the corresponding Ar-Br distributions. The lower yield and higher excitation of Kr-Br as compared to Ar-Br, are attributed to a larger share of the energy available for the radical going to internal excitation in the case of the Kr-Br product. The different partition of the energy available for Kr-Br also causes significant deviations in the photolysis behavior of Kr-HBr when compared to that of Ar-HBr, in the case of the initial excited vdW state of both clusters. A common feature of the photodissociation of Kr-HBr and Ar-HBr is the manifestation of quantum interference effects in the Kr-Br and Ar-Br rotational state distributions, in the form of pronounced structures of supernumerary rotational rainbows.     

Quasiclassical trajectory study of the reaction NH(X~3∑~-)+H→N(~4S)+H_2

The dynamics of the NH + H→N+H2 reaction has been investigated by means of the 3D quasiclassical trajectory approach by using the LEPS potential energy surface.The calculated rate coefficient is in good agreement with the experimental value.The reaction was found to occur via a direct channel.The product H2 has a cold excitation of rotational state,but has a reverse distribution of the vibrational state with a peak at v=1.Based on the potential energy surface and the trajectory analysis,the reaction mechanism has been explained successfully.     

Quasi-classical trajectory calculations analyzing the reactivity and dynamics of asymmetric stretch mode excitations of methane in the H + CH4 reaction

An exhaustive dynamics study was performed at two collision energies, 1.52 and 2.20 eV, analyzing the effects of the asymmetric (nu3) stretch mode excitation in the reactivity and dynamics of the gas-phase H + CH4 reaction. Quasi-classical trajectory (QCT) calculations, including corrections to avoid zero-point energy leakage along the trajectories, were performed on an analytical potential energy surface previously developed by our group. First, strong coupling between different vibrational modes in the entry channel was observed, indicating that energy can flow between these modes, and therefore that they do not preserve their adiabatic character along the reaction path; i.e., the reaction is nonadiabatic. Second, we found that the reactant vibrational excitation has a significant influence on the vibrational and rotational product distributions. With respect to the vibrational distribution, our results confirm the purely qualitative experimental evidence, although the theoretical results presented here are also quantitative. The rotational distributions are predictive, because no experimental data have been reported. Third, with respect to the reactivity, we found that the nu3 mode excitation by one quantum is more reactive than the ground state by a factor of about 2, independently of the collision energy, and in agreement with the experimental measurement of 3.0 +/- 1.5. Fourth, the state-to-state angular distributions of the products reproduce the experimental behavior at 1.52 eV, where the CH3 products scatter sideways and backward. At 2.20 eV this experimental information is not available, and therefore the results reported here are again predictive. The satisfactory reproduction of a great variety of experimental data by the present QCT study lends confidence to the potential energy surface constructed by our group and to those results whose accuracy cannot be checked by comparison with experiment.     

A six-dimensional wave packet study of the vibrational overtone induced decomposition of hydrogen peroxide

A converged quantum wave packet study is presented for the unimolecular reaction HOOH → OH+OH induced by the fifth OH-overtone excitation employing an ab initio potential energy surface. All six internal vibrational degrees of freedom are explicitly represented in this simulation for total angular momentum zero. It is found that the decay of the survival probability and of the autocorrelation function is non-exponential and that the long time dynamics is likely due to the superposition of a number of resonance states. The simulated overtone spectrum and rotational product distribution is in good agreement with experimental measurements. It is concluded that: (1) the reaction dynamics is non-statistical on a 30 ps timescale, (2) the observed line width is roughly a factor of 1.7 larger than implied by the reactive lifetimes suggesting that a significant portion of the linewidth is due to intramolecular vibrational energy relaxation, and (3) the quantum reaction rate is suppressed by about a factor of two relative to its classical counterpart.     

Excitation wavelength dependence of primary charge separation in reaction centers from Rhodobacter sphaeroides

The excitation wavelength dependence of the initial electron transfer rate in both wild type and mutant reaction centers from Rhodobacter sphaeroides has been studied between 840 and 920 nm as a function of temperature (10-295 K). The dynamics of primary charge separation show no resolvable excitation wavelength dependence at room temperature over this spectral range. A small variation in rate with excitation wavelength is observed at cryogenic temperatures. The low temperature results cannot be explained in terms either of a nonequilibrium model that assumes that the primary charge separation starts from a vibrationally hot state or a model that assumes a static inhomogeneous distribution of electron transfer driving forces. Instead these results are consistent with the concept that primary charge separation kinetics are controlled by the dynamics of protein conformational diffusion.     

On-the-fly ab initio trajectory calculations of the dynamics of Cl atom reactions with methane, ethane and methanol

The dynamics of Cl atom reactions with methane, ethane, and methanol have been studied by calculation of quasi-classical trajectories, with computation of potential energies and gradients only at the geometries through which the trajectories pass. Trajectories were started from the transition state, with 2 kcal mol(-1) of energy given to the mode with an imaginary frequency (representing the reaction coordinate at the transition state) and inclusion of zero-point energy in some or all of the remaining vibrational modes. The trajectories were propagated as far as separated products, with the majority of potential energy calculations performed at the HF/6-31G level of theory. The rotational quantum state population distributions of the HCl products from the reactions of Cl atoms with methane, ethane and methanol peaked at J'=1, 2, and 6, respectively. The calculations thereby exhibit somewhat greater rotational excitation than is found experimentally, but correctly describe the trend of increasing HCl product rotation for the three respective reactions. In agreement with previous observations, only 4% of the energy available to the products of the reaction of Cl atoms with methane was channeled into CH3 radical internal energy, and 1% into HCl rotation, with 92% ending up as translational energy. For the reaction of Cl atoms with ethane and with methanol, the corresponding values for radical internal energy, HCl rotation and product translation are 21, 3, and 78%, and 46, 13, and 42%, respectively. For the latter two reactions, the radical internal energy is mostly accounted for by rotational motion. The clear increase in rotational excitation of the HCl products from the Cl atom reaction with methanol is explained in terms of a dipole-dipole interaction between the departing polar fragments. A smaller set of more computationally expensive trajectory calculations using potentials and gradients from the MP2/6-311G(d,p) level of theory were performed for reactions of Cl atoms with methanol, and give results in better agreement with experimentally measured HCl rotational excitation, consistent with the model of dipole-induced product rotation because the MP2/6-311G(d,p) calculations give smaller dipole moments for both products than the HF/6-31G calculations. The calculated angles between the rotational angular momentum vectors and recoil velocities of the radical peak sharply at 90 degrees for the reactions of Cl atoms with ethane and methanol, but exhibit a much broader distribution for reaction with methane.     

Excitation wavelength and fluence dependent femtosecond transient absorption studies on electron dynamics of gold nanorods

The electron dynamics of gold nanorods were systematically studied by using femtosecond transient absorption experiments. Two different excitation wavelengths (400 and 800 nm) have been used as the excitation sources to selectively excite transverse and longitudinal modes. The transient absorption spectra were found to be strongly dependent on the excitation wavelength and fluence. Laser pulses of 800 nm excite the longitudinal mode directly, which cause an increase in the electronic temperatures and subsequent broadening and bleaching of both the longitudinal and transverse modes. Pulses of 400 nm excite both the transverse and longitudinal modes simultaneously. At low excitation fluences, the energy is distributed into two modes according to their steady state extinction coefficients, under which the transient spectra are similar to those under excitation at 800 nm. However, as the excitation fluence exceeds a threshold, the bleaching of the longitudinal plasmon band saturates and the input energies mainly flow to the transverse mode. As a result, the bleaching of the transverse mode increases rapidly. The electron-phonon dynamics show a strong correlation with the bleaching amplitude. We have tried to explain the results with a consistent picture: the bleaching amplitude and electron-phonon relaxation time are directly related to energy distribution into different modes, which are excitation wavelength and fluence dependent. Our studies help to clarify the seemingly inconsistent results in the previous studies by different research groups.