Methyl nitrite (CH3ONO) is a molecule that has been studied extensively in chemical dynamics, by both theory and experiment, because of its small size, ease of synthesis, and excited state properties. CH3ONO has two stable conformations, cis and trans, shown below. Laser excitation to the S2 state causes prompt dissociation to methoxy and NO. Our hypothesis was that photodissociation will generate NO with different vector correlations, depending on the conformer excited. At longer wavelengths (280 nm), theory predicts that trans-CH3ONO is excited but at shorter wavelengths (230 nm), cis-CH3ONO is excited. Using polarized lasers and velocity-mapped ion imaging, we photodissociated CH3ONO at 230 and 280 nm and determined the bipolar harmonics, including β20(20), corresponding to µ-v correlation, β20(02), corresponding to µ-J correlation, and β00(22), corresponding to v-J correlation in the dissociating molecules . This contribution will present the results.

Photodissociation of cis- and trans-CH3ONO: Is conformation destiny?

249th National Meeting (2015)

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