Multiphoton excitation radiation

The Goeppert-Mayer two- (or multi-) photon absorption, mechanism (ii), may look similar, but it involves intennediate levels far from resonance with one-photon absorption. A third, quasi-resonant stepwise mechanism (iii), proceeds via smgle- photon excitation steps involvmg near-resonant intennediate levels. Finally, in mechanism (iv), there is the stepwise multiphoton absorption of incoherent radiation from themial light sources or broad-band statistical multimode lasers. In principle, all of these processes and their combinations play a role in the multiphoton excitation of atoms and molecules, but one can broadly... 

B) The multiphoton excitation of electronic levels of atoms and molecules with visible or UV radiation generally leads to ionization. The mechanism is generally a combination of direct, Goeppert-Mayer, and quasi-resonant stepwise processes. Since ionization often requires only two or tln-ee photons, this type of multiphoton excitation is used for spectroscopic purposes in combination with mass-spectrometric detection of ions. 

B2.5.351 after multiphoton excitation via the CF stretching vibration at 1070 cm. More than 17 photons are needed to break the C-I bond, a typical value in IR laser chemistry. Contributions from direct absorption (i) are insignificant, so that the process almost exclusively follows the quasi-resonant mechanism (iii), which can be treated by generalized first-order kinetics. As an example, figure B2.5.15 illustrates the fonnation of I atoms (upper trace) during excitation with the pulse sequence of a mode-coupled CO2 laser (lower trace). In addition to the mtensity, /, the fluence, F, of radiation is a very important parameter in IR laser chemistry (and more generally in nuiltiphoton excitation) ... 

When the radiation is intense, more than one photon may become involved in a single transition (this is called multiphoton excitation), and the selection rules are, again, no longer the same (chapter 9). 

The powerful VUV generated by resonant frequency mixing is suited for applications which require very intense laser radiation like the multiphoton excitation of atoms and molecules, photodissociation studies of molecules or plasma diagnostics. 

In order for a photochemical reaction to occur the radiation must be absorbed, and with the advent of the quantum theory it became possible to understand the relationship between the amount of radiation absorbed and the extent of the chemical change that occurs. It was first realized by A. Einstein (1879-1955) that electromagnetic radiation can be regarded as a beam of particles, which G. N. Lewis (1875-1940) later called photons each of these particles has an energy equal to /iv, where v is the frequency of the radiation and h is the Planck constant. In 1911 J. Stark (1874-1957) and independently in 1912 Einstein proposed that one photon of radiation is absorbed by one molecule. This relationship, usually referred to as Einstein s Law of Photochemical Equivalence, applies satisfactorily to electromagnetic radiation of ordinary intensities but fails for lasers of very high intensity. The lifetime of a moleeule that has absorbed a photon is usually less than about 10 sec, and with ordinary radiation it is unlikely for a molecule that has absorbed one photon to absorb another before it has become deactivated. In these circumstances there is therefore a one-to-one relationship between the number of photons absorbed and the number of excited molecules produced. Because of the high intensity of lasers, however, a molecule sometimes absorbs two or more photons, and one then speaks of multiphoton excitation. 

In addition, new tandem mass spectrometry technologies were also among the important innovations. Apart from traditional collision-induced dissociation (CID) [89-91], a variety of activation methods (used to add energy to mass-selected ions) based on inelastic collisions and photon absorption have been widely utilized. They include IR multiphoton excitation [92,93], UV laser excitation [94—97], surface-induced dissociation (SID) [98-100], black body radiation (101, 102], thermal dissociation [103], and others. As the fragmentation of peptide/protein ions is a central topic in proteomics, there is strong interest in such novel ion dissociation methods as electron capture dissociation (ECD) [104, 105] and electron transfer dissociation [22]. These new methods can provide structural information that complements that obtained by traditional collisional activation. Also, very recently, ambient ion dissociation methods such as atmospheric pressure thermal dissociation [106] and low temperature plasma assisted ion dissociation [107] have been reported. 

The intensities of lasers exceed by many orders of magnitude those of conventional light sources. At high intensity levels, nonlinear interaction of light with atomic and molecular systems becomes pronounced. New analytical techniques involving multistep and multiphoton excitation and ionization, optical saturation, and excitation of forbidden transitions become possible. High radiation intensity also increases the sensitivity of laser analytical techniques,... 

Fig. 10.5 Schemes for resonance molecular photoionization via high-lying vibrational states by way of multiphoton resonance vibrational excitation with IR laser radiation (a) multiphoton IR + VUV excitation, (b) IR multiphoton excitation, and (c) IR multistep + VUV excitation.

The basic multiphoton excitation experiment simply involves focusing tuneable laser radiation into a cell containing a low pressure (typically a few torr) of the atomic or molecular gas of interest and observing the resulting laser-induced fluorescence or, more commonly, the resulting ions or electrons (in the case of REMPI detection). In the latter experiment, the cell will typically be equipped with a pair of biased electrodes an MPI spectrum is ob-... 

Statistical Mechanical Theory of Multiphoton Excitation with Monochromatic Coherent Radiation 1785... 

How can one describe theoretically, with feasible computational implementation, the primary processes of multiphoton excitation by strong radiation fields from lasers, where sometimes several photons, often dozens and in extreme cases hundreds of photons are absorbed in single atoms or molecules, leading to subsequent reactions such as fragmentation and ionization This is the core question of the theory of multiphoton excitation addressed in this article. 

Mechanism (iv) in Figure 2 of the multiphoton excitation through quasiresonant intermediates by incoherent broad band ( white ) light sources can be described by a rate equation treatment (generalized first order kinetics). Thermal radiation certainly belongs to this class, but some broad band laser sources do too. Introducing the z-polarized intensity per frequency band width in equation (95) ... 

STATISTICAL MECHANICAL THEORY OF MULTIPHOTON EXCITATION WITH MONOCHROMATIC COHERENT RADIATION... 

Another example of a teclmique for detecting absorption of laser radiation in gaseous samples is to use multiphoton ionization with mtense pulses of light. Once a molecule has been electronically excited, the excited state may absorb one or more additional photons until it is ionized. The electrons can be measured as a current generated across the cell, or can be counted individually by an electron multiplier this can be a very sensitive technique for detecting a small number of molecules excited. 

In contrast to the ionization of C q after vibrational excitation, typical multiphoton ionization proceeds via the excitation of higher electronic levels. In principle, multiphoton ionization can either be used to generate ions and to study their reactions, or as a sensitive detection technique for atoms, molecules, and radicals in reaction kinetics. The second application is more common. In most cases of excitation with visible or UV laser radiation, a few photons are enough to reach or exceed the ionization limit. A particularly important teclmique is resonantly enlianced multiphoton ionization (REMPI), which exploits the resonance of monocluomatic laser radiation with one or several intennediate levels (in one-photon or in multiphoton processes). The mechanisms are distinguished according to the number of photons leading to the resonant intennediate levels and to tire final level, as illustrated in figure B2.5.16. Several lasers of different frequencies may be combined. 

As an example, we mention the detection of iodine atoms in their P3/2 ground state with a 3 + 2 multiphoton ionization process at a laser wavelength of 474.3 run. Excited iodine atoms ( Pi/2) can also be detected selectively as the resonance condition is reached at a different laser wavelength of 477.7 run. As an example, figure B2.5.17 hows REMPI iodine atom detection after IR laser photolysis of CF I. This pump-probe experiment involves two, delayed, laser pulses, with a 200 ns IR photolysis pulse and a 10 ns probe pulse, which detects iodine atoms at different times during and after the photolysis pulse. This experiment illustrates a frindamental problem of product detection by multiphoton ionization with its high intensity, the short-wavelength probe laser radiation alone can photolyse the... 

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