Photoionisation of rotationally cooled Hydrogen beyond the Born-Oppenheimer approximation.

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Title
Photoionisation of rotationally cooled Hydrogen beyond the Born-Oppenheimer approximation.

CoPED ID
394b95ea-91a6-43a1-bf0d-37d8e143b9e8

Status
Closed

Funders

Value
£11,712

Start Date
June 30, 2006

End Date
July 30, 2006

Description

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Molecular hydrogen is the simplest and most abundant neutral molecule in the Universe. Due to its relative simplicity it is the natural starting point for both experimental and theoretical studies. It is also gaining technological importance through its use in fuel cells for the environmentally-friendly production of energy. A fundamental process involving molecular hydrogen is photoionisation by ultra violet light where a photon ejects an electron from the molecule. However, despite the simplicity of the molecule it is observed that the photoionisation spectrum is not simple and smooth, as would be expected if the photon ionised the molecule in a direct manner. Instead it is dominated by a wealth of sharp structure which arises because it is much more likely for photoionisation to occur in a two-step process. Here a high-lying, neutral state of H2 is first excited by absorption of a photon. This state then decays to the molecular ion H2+ with the emission of a photoelectron in a process called autoionisation. Apart from being the dominant process, autoionisation is important because it involves interactions between electronic motion and the molecular motions of rotation and vibration that do not occur in direct photoionisation. The excitation and decay paths involved in this two-step process can be investigated by observing the energies and yields of the ejected photoelectrons. Furthermore, by measuring the angular behaviour of the emitted photoelectron it is possible to determine the angular momentum exchanged between the photoelectron and the molecular ion. In practice this picture becomes more complicated because more than one rotational level of the hydrogen molecule is populated at room temperature. The photoionisation spectra are then considerably more complex, and more importantly, it makes it much more difficult to connect experiment with theory. Previous experiments have generally been a sum over several rotational levels of the ground vibrational state of H2. This lack of rotationally-selected experimental data remains a road block to the theoretical development of this fundamental system. We have developed experimental techniques to put more than 99% of the target H2 molecules into a single rotational level. We have built an electron spectrometer that allows us to identify individual rotational levels of the final ionic state and measure the angular behaviour of the photoelectrons. We also have access to an ultra violet light source with the necessary spectral resolution to isolate individual rotational levels of the intermediate neutral states. Brought together this enables a comprehensive study of photoionisation in a molecule for well defined rotational states in: the initial target state, the intermediate state and the final ion state. A final capability is that we can substitute H2 by the isotope D2. This slightly shifts the molecular energy levels and can reveal transitions that are otherwise hidden while the change in inter-nuclear separation modifies the dynamics of the photoionisation process. The proposed experiments would thus provide a complete and clear picture of photoionisation in this fundamental molecular system.

George King PI_PER

Subjects by relevance
  1. Molecules
  2. Ions
  3. Hydrogen
  4. Spectroscopy
  5. Isotopes

Extracted key phrases
  1. Photoionisation process
  2. Direct photoionisation
  3. Photoionisation spectrum
  4. Molecular energy level
  5. Molecular ion H2
  6. Target H2 molecule
  7. Intermediate neutral state
  8. Final ion state
  9. Rotational state
  10. Abundant neutral molecule
  11. Molecular hydrogen
  12. Fundamental molecular system
  13. Individual rotational level
  14. Single rotational level
  15. Initial target state

Related Pages

UKRI project entry

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