7=1 rotational level

These limitations lead to electron spin multiplicity restrictions and to differing nuclear spin statistical weights for the rotational levels. Writing the electronic wavefunction as the product of an orbital fiinction and a spin fiinction there are restrictions on how these functions can be combined. The restrictions are imposed by the fact that the complete function has to be of synnnetry... 

This means diat half the rotational levels of every vibronic state are missing in this molecule. Missing levels arise in other molecules and can also involve nuclei with nonzero spin they arise for the aimnonia molecule NH3. 

While a laser beam can be used for traditional absorption spectroscopy by measuring / and 7q, the strength of laser spectroscopy lies in more specialized experiments which often do not lend themselves to such measurements. Other techniques are connnonly used to detect the absorption of light from the laser beam. A coimnon one is to observe fluorescence excited by the laser. The total fluorescence produced is nonnally proportional to the amount of light absorbed. It can be used as a measurement of concentration to detect species present in extremely small amounts. Or a measurement of the fluorescence intensity as the laser frequency is scaimed can give an absorption spectrum. This may allow much higher resolution than is easily obtained with a traditional absorption spectrometer. In other experiments the fluorescence may be dispersed and its spectrum detennined with a traditional spectrometer. In suitable cases this could be the emission from a single electronic-vibrational-rotational level of a molecule and the experimenter can study how the spectrum varies with level. 

If the experunental technique has sufficient resolution, and if the molecule is fairly light, the vibronic bands discussed above will be found to have a fine structure due to transitions among rotational levels in the two states. Even when the individual rotational lines caimot be resolved, the overall shape of the vibronic band will be related to the rotational structure and its analysis may help in identifying the vibronic symmetry. The analysis of the band appearance depends on calculation of the rotational energy levels and on the selection rules and relative intensity of different rotational transitions. These both come from the fonn of the rotational wavefunctions and are treated by angnlar momentum theory. It is not possible to do more than mention a simple example here. 

The spectral perturbations are observed in a transition involving one of the interacting states. Sometimes it is possible also to see an electronic transition involving the other of the interacting states, and then one should see equal but opposite displacements of rotational levels with the same /. 

Conventional spontaneous Raman scattering is the oldest and most widely used of the Raman based spectroscopic methods. It has served as a standard teclmique for the study of molecular vibrational and rotational levels in gases, and for both intra- and inter-molecular excitations in liquids and solids. (For example, a high resolution study of the vibrons and phonons at low temperatures in crystalline benzene has just appeared [38].)... 

The most widely employed optical method for the study of chemical reaction dynamics has been laser-induced fluorescence. This detection scheme is schematically illustrated in the left-hand side of figure B2.3.8. A tunable laser is scanned tlnough an electronic band system of the molecule, while the fluorescence emission is detected. This maps out an action spectrum that can be used to detemiine the relative concentrations of the various vibration-rotation levels of the molecule. 

For high rotational levels, or for a moleeule like OFI, for whieh the spin-orbit splitting is small, even for low J, the pattern of rotational/fme-stnieture levels approaehes the Flund s ease (b) limit. In this situation, it is not meaningful to speak of the projeetion quantum number Rather, we first eonsider the rotational angular momentum N exelusive of the eleetron spin. This is then eoupled with the spin to yield levels with total angular momentum J = N + dand A - d. As before, there are two nearly degenerate pairs of levels assoeiated... 

NH in its v = 1 vibrational level and in a high rotational level (e.g. J> 30) prepared by laser excitation of vibrationally cold NH in v = 0 having high J (due to nahiral Boltzmann populations), see figure B3.T3 and... 

As was shown in the preceding discussion (see also Sections Vin and IX), the rovibronic wave functions for a homonuclear diatomic molecule under the permutation of identical nuclei are symmetric for even J rotational quantum numbers in and E electronic states antisymmeUic for odd J values in and E elecbonic states symmetric for odd J values in E and E electronic states and antisymmeteic for even J values in Ej and E+ electeonic states. Note that the vibrational ground state is symmetric under pemrutation of the two nuclei. The most restrictive result arises therefore when the nuclear spin quantum number of the individual nuclei is 0. In this case, the nuclear spin function is always symmetric with respect to interchange of the identical nuclei, and hence only totally symmeUic rovibronic states are allowed since the total wave function must be symmetric for bosonic systems. For example, the nucleus has zero nuclear spin, and hence the rotational levels with odd values of J do not exist for the ground electronic state f EJ") of Cr. 

Finally, let us consider molecules with identical nuclei that are subject to C (n > 2) rotations. For C2v molecules in which the C2 rotation exchanges two nuclei of half-integer spin, the nuclear statistical weights of the symmetric and antisymmetric rotational levels will be one and three, respectively. For molecules where C2 exchanges two spinless nuclei, one-half of the rotational levels (odd or even J values, depending on the vibrational and electronic states)... 

The radial motion of a diatomie moleeule in its lowest (J=0) rotational level ean be deseribed by the following Sehrodinger equation ... 

There is a stack of rotational levels, with term values such as those given by Equation (5.19), associated with not only the zero-point vibrational level but also all the other vibrational levels shown, for example, in Figure 1.13. However, the Boltzmann equation (Equation 2.11), together with the vibrational energy level expression (Equation 1.69), gives the ratio of the population of the wth vibrational level to Nq, that of the zero-point level, as... 

As indicated in Figure 5.18,/>ara- lT2 can exist in only even/states and ortho- ll2 in odd J states. At temperatures at which there is appreciable population up to fairly high values of J there is roughly three times as much ortho- as there is para- l2- Flowever, at very low temperatures at which the population of all rotational levels other than J= 0 is small IT2 is mostly in the para form. 

Each vibrational transition observed in the gas phase gives rise to what is called a band in the spectmm. The word line is reserved for describing a transition between rotational levels associated with the two vibrational levels giving rise to the fine stmcture of a band. However, in the solid or liquid phase, where this fine stmcture is not present, each vibrational transition is sometimes referred to as a line rather than a band. 

For all types of 2i vibrational levels the stack of rotational levels associated with them is given by... 

Just as for diatomics, for a polyatomic molecule rotational levels are symmetric (5 ) or antisymmetric (a) to nuclear exchange which, when nuclear spins are taken into account, may result in an intensity alternation with J. These labels are given in Figure 6.24. 

Also given in Figure 6.24 are the parity labels, + or —, and the alternative e or/ labels for each rotational level. The general selection rules involving these properties are ... 

In an E vibrational state there is some splitting of rotational levels, compared with those of Figure 5.6(a), due to Coriolis forces, rather than that found in a If vibrational state, but the main difference in an E — band from an — A band is due to the selection rules... 

For electronic or vibronic transitions there is a set of accompanying rotational transitions between the stacks of rotational levels associated with the upper and lower electronic or vibronic states, in a rather similar way to infrared vibrational transitions (Section 6.1.4.1). The main differences are caused by there being a wider range of electronic or vibronic transitions they are not confined to 2" — 2" types and the upper and lower states may not be singlet states nor need their multiplicities to be the same. These possibilities result in a variety of types of rotational fine structure, but we shall confine ourselves to 2" — 2" and — types of transitions only. 

In Figure 7.25 are shown stacks of rotational levels associated with two electronic states between which a transition is allowed by the -F -F and, if it is a homonuclear diatomic, g u selection rules of Equations (7.70) and (7.71). The sets of levels would be similar if both were states or if the upper state were g and the lower state u The rotational term values for any X state are given by the expression encountered first in Equation (5.23), namely... 

The +, —, e, and/labels attached to the levels in Figure 7.25 have the same meaning as those in Figure 6.24 showing rotational levels associated with and Ig vibrational levels of a linear polyatomic molecule. Flowever, just as in that case, they can be ignored for a Z — I, type of electronic transition. 

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