Femtosecond X-ray Liquidography Visualizes Wavepacket Trajectories in Multidimensional Nuclear Coordinates for a Bimolecular Reaction

Torsional Structural Relaxation Caused by Pt-Pt Bond Formation in the Photoexcited Dimer of Pt(II) N ̂ C ̂ N Complex in Solution

[Pt(NCN)MeCN]+ (NCN = 1,3-di(2-pyridyl)benzene, MeCN = acetonitrile) forms oligomers in the ground state due to metallophilic interactions, and a Pt-Pt bond is formed with photoexcitation. Ultrafast excited-state dynamics of the [Pt(NCN)MeCN]+ dimer in acetonitrile is investigated by femtosecond time-resolved absorption (TA) and picosecond emission spectroscopy. The femtosecond TA signals exhibit 60 cm-1 oscillations arising from the Pt-Pt stretching motion in the S1 dimer. The excited-state absorption in the 500-700 nm region increases with time constants of 0.3, 1.4, and 9.4 ps, which are assigned to contraction of the Pt-Pt distance, structural change in the S1 dimer, and S1 → T1 intersystem crossing, respectively. The 1.4 ps structural change is attributed to torsional structural relaxation proceeding in the S1 dimer based on the computation, which indicates that a torsional angle around the Pt-Pt bond in the S0 dimer is widely distributed around two potential minima, whereas that of the S1 dimer has much narrower distributions around noticeably different torsional angles.

Projection to extract the perpendicular component (PEPC) method for extracting kinetics from time-resolved data

Time-resolved x-ray liquidography (TRXL) is a potent method for investigating the structural dynamics of chemical and biological reactions in the liquid phase. It has enabled the extraction of detailed structural aspects of various dynamic processes, the molecular structures of intermediates, and kinetics of reactions across a wide range of systems, from small molecules to proteins and nanoparticles. Proper data analysis is key to extracting the information of the kinetics and structural dynamics of the studied system encrypted in the TRXL data. In typical TRXL data, the signals from solute scattering, solvent scattering, and solute-solvent cross scattering are mixed in the q-space, and the solute kinetics and solvent hydrodynamics are mixed in the time domain, thus complicating the data analysis. Various methods developed so far generally require prior knowledge of the molecular structures of candidate species involved in the reaction. Because such information is often unavailable, a typical data analysis often involves tedious trial and error. To remedy this situation, we have developed a method named projection to extract the perpendicular component (PEPC), capable of removing the contribution of solvent kinetics from TRXL data. The resulting data then contain only the solute kinetics, and, thus, the solute kinetics can be easily determined. Once the solute kinetics is determined, the subsequent data analysis to extract the structural information can be performed with drastically improved convenience. The application of the PEPC method is demonstrated with TRXL data from the photochemistry of two molecular systems: [Au(CN)₂^-]₃ in water and CHI₃ in cyclohexane.

From a one-mode to a multi-mode understanding of conical intersection mediated ultrafast organic photochemical reactions

This review discusses how ultrafast organic photochemical reactions are controlled by conical intersections, highlighting that decay to the ground-state at multiple points of the intersection space results in their multi-mode character.

Optically Induced Anisotropy in Time-Resolved Scattering: Imaging Molecular-Scale Structure and Dynamics in Disordered Media with Experiment and Theory

Time-resolved scattering experiments enable imaging of materials at the molecular scale with femtosecond time resolution. However, in disordered media they provide access to just one radial dimension thus limiting the study of orientational structure and dynamics. Here we introduce a rigorous and practical theoretical framework for predicting and interpreting experiments combining optically induced anisotropy and time-resolved scattering. Using impulsive nuclear Raman and ultrafast x-ray scattering experiments of chloroform and simulations, we demonstrate that this framework can accurately predict and elucidate both the spatial and temporal features of these experiments.

Ligand-Field Effects in a Ruthenium(II) Polypyridyl Complex Probed by Femtosecond X-ray Absorption Spectroscopy

We employ femtosecond X-ray absorption spectroscopy of [Ru(m-bpy)₃]²⁺ (m-bpy = 6-methyl-2,2'-bipyridine) to elucidate the time evolution of the spin and charge density upon metal-to-ligand charge-transfer (MLCT) excitation. The core-level transitions at the Ru L₃-edge reveal a very short MLCT lifetime of 0.9 ps and relaxation to the lowest triplet metal-centered state (³MC) which exhibits a lifetime of about 300 ps. Time-dependent density functional theory relates ligand methylation to a lower ligand field strength that stabilizes the ³MC state. A quarter of the ³MLCT population appears to be trapped which may be attributed to intramolecular vibrational relaxation or further electron transfer to the solvent. Our results demonstrate that small changes in the ligand field allow control of the photophysical properties. Moreover, this study underscores the high information content of femtosecond L-edge spectroscopy as a probe of valence charge density and spin-state in 4d transition metals.