Franck-Condon limit

The autocorrelation function picture of a frequency domain spectrum (Heller, 1981) is derived as follows. Consider the e,v e <— g, t>" electronic absorption spectrum. In the Franck-Condon limit (constant transition moment) and neglecting rotation, the eigenstate spectrum observed from the v" vibrational level... 

To understand the features that are described in the Franck-Condon-limit, we introduce the definition of the state to state photodissociation cross sections ... 

The requirement of a very sharjD and strong electronic origin absorjDtion line limits the technique to strongly absorbing and fluorescing, relatively rigid cliromophores and matrices having little Franck-Condon activity in low-frequency... 

In electronic spectra there is no restriction on the values that Au can take but, as we shall see in Section 1.2.53, the Franck-Condon principle imposes limitations on the intensities of the transitions. 

Section 6.13.2 and illustrated in Figure 6.5. The possible inaccuracies of the method were made clear and it was stressed that these are reduced by obtaining term values near to the dissociation limit. Whether this can be done depends very much on the relative dispositions of the various potential curves in a particular molecule and whether electronic transitions between them are allowed. How many ground state vibrational term values can be obtained from an emission spectrum is determined by the Franck-Condon principle. If r c r" then progressions in emission are very short and few term values result but if r is very different from r", as in the A U — system of carbon monoxide discussed in Section 7.2.5.4, long progressions are observed in emission and a more accurate value of Dq can be obtained. 

Sethna [1981] considered two limiting cases. The calculation of action in the fast flip approximation (a>j CO ) proceeds by utilizing the expansion exp ( — cu,-1t ) 1 — cu t. After substituting the first term, i.e. the unity, in (5.72) we get precisely the quantity which yields the Franck-Condon factor in the rate constant. The next term cancels the adiabatic renormalization and changes KM)... 

As we have reviewed here, the linear region is not fully repulsive, and transitions of the ground-state, linear conformer access vibrationally excited intermolecular levels that are delocalized in the angular coordinate. As depicted in Fig. 1, however, the internuclear distance is significantly longer in the excited state at the linear geometry. Consequently, there is favorable Franck-Condon overlap of the linear conformer with the inner-repulsive wall of the excited-state potential. It is therefore possible for the linear Rg XY conformers to be promoted to the continuum of states just above each Rg - - XY B,v ) dissociation limit. 

The height of the potential barrier separating the initial and final states of the nuclear subsystem decreases and, hence, the Franck-Condon factor increases (Fig. 6). In the classical limit, this results in a decrease of the activation free energy. 

In principle, refined and relatively reliable quantum-theoretical methods are available for the calculation of the energy change associated with the process of equation 2. They take into account the changes in geometry, in electron distribution and in electron correlation which accompany the transition M(1 fio) — M+ (2 P/-), and also vibronic interactions between the radical cation states. Such sophisticated treatments yield not only reliable predictions for the different ionization energies 7 , 77 or 7 , but also rather precise Franck-Condon envelopes for the individual bands in the PE spectrum. However, the computational expenditure of these methods still limits their application to smaller molecules. We shall mention them later in connection with examples where such treatments are required. 

In spectroscopy we may distinguish two types of process, adiabatic and vertical. Adiabatic excitation energies are by definition thermodynamic ones, and they are usually further defined to refer to at 0° K. In practice, at least for electronic spectroscopy, one is more likely to observe vertical processes, because of the Franck-Condon principle. The simplest principle for understandings solvation effects on vertical electronic transitions is the two-response-time model in which the solvent is assumed to have a fast response time associated with electronic polarization and a slow response time associated with translational, librational, and vibrational motions of the nuclei.92 One assumes that electronic excitation is slow compared with electronic response but fast compared with nuclear response. The latter assumption is quite reasonable, but the former is questionable since the time scale of electronic excitation is quite comparable to solvent electronic polarization (consider, e.g., the excitation of a 4.5 eV n — n carbonyl transition in a solvent whose frequency response is centered at 10 eV the corresponding time scales are 10 15 s and 2 x 10 15 s respectively). A theory that takes account of the similarity of these time scales would be very difficult, involving explicit electron correlation between the solute and the macroscopic solvent. One can, however, treat the limit where the solvent electronic response is fast compared to solute electronic transitions this is called the direct reaction field (DRF). 49,93 The accurate answer must lie somewhere between the SCRF and DRF limits 94 nevertheless one can obtain very useful results with a two-time-scale version of the more manageable SCRF limit, as illustrated by a very successful recent treatment... 

A semiclassical description is well established when both the Hamilton operator of the system and the quantity to be calculated have a well-defined classical analog. For example, there exist several semiclassical methods for calculating the vibrational autocorrelation function on a single excited electronic surface, the Fourier transform of which yields the Franck-Condon spectmm [108, 109, 150, 244]. In particular, semiclassical methods based on the initial-value representation of the semiclassical propagator [104-111, 245-248], which circumvent the cumbersome root-search problem in boundary-value-based semiclassical methods, have been successfully applied to a variety of systems (see, for example, Refs. 110, 111, 161, and 249 and references therein). The mapping procedure introduced in Section VI results in a quantum-mechanical Hamiltonian with a well-defined classical limit, and therefore it... 

The most probable transitions, according to the Franck-Condon principle are the vertical ones. They correspond to the maxima of electron groups in the kinetic spectrum. The upper limits in the kinetic energies for each group correspond to the adiabatic ionization potentials. Thus from the difference of these energy values one can get the difference Ip between the vertical and adiabatic potentials (Table IV). 

We study two adiabatic schemes that, use a sequence of time-delayed transform limited pulses. The first one, known as STIRAP (Stimulated Raman adiabatic passage) controls the population transfer between three vibrational states. The frequency of the first pulse (t)[ is tuned in resonance with the transition from 4> (x) to the intermediate state (f>i0 x), and the frequency of the second pulse [ 2(t)] is resonant with the transition from i0 x) to 4>q x) i0 x) is the intermediate state that maximizes the Franck-Condon factors for both transitions at the same time, working as an efficient wave function bridge between the initial and target wave functions [5]. Using counterintuitive pulses, such that (t) precedes x (t), the wave function of the system has the interesting form [3]... 

Here we report our exploration of the possibility of inducing an ultrafast non-Franck-Condon transition, which we defined to be the creation of a wave packet at the other turning point of the above-mentioned oscillation, see Fig. 1(b), faster than the time it takes the Franck-Condon packet to reach that turning point due to the natural (field-free) dynamics. We have explored two possible routes for inducing non-Franck-Condon transitions, namely phase-tailoring of a weak-field ultraviolet (UV) pulse [6] tmd a two-pulse scheme combining a transform limited weak-field UV pulse with a strong infrared (IR) field [7]. 

With this setup, the IR field affects the nuclear dynamics in the lower electronic state (injects energy) in the time interval from f0 to T, i.e., prior to excitation to the upper electronic state. In the limit where this time interval is small, the IR field simply boosts the momentum of the wave packet. This implies that the UV delta pulse instead of creating a Franck-Condon wave packet at rest on a down-hill slope on V2 creates a Franck-Condon wave packet with a positive (mean) velocity. 

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