First-order transition, occurrence process

Besides fine-structure splitting, the occurrence of spin-forbidden transitions is the most striking feature in which spin-orbit interaction manifests itself. Radiative spin-forbidden transitions in light molecules usually take place at the millisecond time scale, if the transition is dipole allowed. A dipole- and spin-forbidden transition is even weaker, with lifetimes of the order of seconds. Proceeding down the periodic table, spin-forbidden transitions become more and more allowed due to the increase of spin-orbit coupling. For molecules containing elements with principal quantum number 5 or higher (and the late first-row transition metals Ni and Cu), there is hardly any difference between transition probabilities of spin-allowed and spin-forbidden processes. 

On the theoretical front, it is possible to make a few simple assertions. We have already seen that a collisional component to the randomisation process may become faster the more dense are the states of the molecule. It is also obvious that the first order component will become slower as the states become further apart, but the molecular level density where this begins is not known a cut-off at about 1000 states per wavenumber has been suggested [82.S2] for intramolecular vibrational relaxation of isolated molecules in one kind of experiment. It is also obvious that there must be propensity rules for the occurrence of randomising transitions within any grain [81.P2] for example, transitions between states of... 

---