Cold cations of transition metal-acetylene complexes are produced in pulsed supersonic molecular beams by laser vaporization of solid rod targets.  These ions are mass-selected and studied with infrared photodissociation spectroscopy in the C-H stretching region.  Vibrational patterns are compared to the predictions of density functional theory to elucidate the structures of these ions and their electronic states.  The spectra reveal coordination numbers and vibrational shifts as a function of cluster size.  Ligand shifts compared to the predictions of theory provide the spin state on the transition metal cation and how it changes upon progressive ligand addition.  In the case of copper and gold complexes, simple coordination and solvation occurs, whereas in the case of vanadium and zinc complexes intracluster reactions leading to acetylene coupling are detected.  Additional experiments use selected-ion photofragment imaging experiments to probe metal-ligand binding energetics.

Infrared spectroscopy of metal ion-acetylene complexes: Coordination, solvation and reactions

2019 Spring National Meeting

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