skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Probing ultrafast ππ*/nπ* internal conversion in organic chromophores via K-edge resonant absorption

Journal Article · · Nature Communications
ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [1];  [3];  [4];  [1];  [5];  [6];  [7];  [1];  [4];  [1];  [8]; ORCiD logo [7];  [9];  [1];  [10]; ORCiD logo [1];  [5];  [1] more »;  [11];  [1];  [2];  [12] « less
  1. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States)
  2. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States); Norwegian Univ. of Science and Technology, Trondheim (Norway)
  3. Univ. degli Studi di Trieste, Trieste (Italy); Technical Univ. of Denmark, Lyngby (Denmark)
  4. Univ. of Gothenburg, Gothenburg (Sweden)
  5. Univ. of Connecticut, Storrs, CT (United States)
  6. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Lemont, IL (United States); Northwestern Univ., Evanston, IL (United States)
  7. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States); Stanford Univ., Stanford, CA (United States)
  8. Ecole Polytechnique Federal de Lausanne, Lausanne (Switzerland)
  9. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States); Stanford Univ., Stanford, CA (United States); RIKEN, Saitama (Japan)
  10. Uppsala Univ., Uppsala (Sweden)
  11. Elettra-Sincrotrone Trieste, Trieste (Italy)
  12. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States); Univ. Potsdam, Potsdam (Germany)

Many photoinduced processes including photosynthesis and human vision happen in organic molecules and involve coupled femtosecond dynamics of nuclei and electrons. Organic molecules with heteroatoms often possess an important excited-state relaxation channel from an optically allowed ππ* to a dark nπ* state. The ππ*/nπ* internal conversion is difficult to investigate, as most spectroscopic methods are not exclusively sensitive to changes in the excited-state electronic structure. Here, we report achieving the required sensitivity by exploiting the element and site specificity of near-edge soft X-ray absorption spectroscopy. As a hole forms in the n orbital during ππ*/nπ* internal conversion, the absorption spectrum at the heteroatom K-edge exhibits an additional resonance. We demonstrate the concept using the nucleobase thymine at the oxygen K-edge, and unambiguously show that ππ*/nπ* internal conversion takes place within (60 ± 30) fs. Furthermore, high-level-coupled cluster calculations confirm the method’s impressive electronic structure sensitivity for excited-state investigations.

Research Organization:
SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-76SF00515
OSTI ID:
1369334
Journal Information:
Nature Communications, Vol. 8, Issue 1; ISSN 2041-1723
Publisher:
Nature Publishing GroupCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 122 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (61)

Linac Coherent Light Source soft x-ray materials science instrument optical design and monochromator commissioning journal September 2011
Coupled cluster response functions journal September 1990
Time-resolved x-ray absorption spectroscopy with a water window high-harmonic source journal January 2017
A theoretical and experimental study of the near edge X-ray absorption fine structure (NEXAFS) and X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS) of nucleobases: Thymine and adenine journal May 2008
Coupled cluster response functions revisited journal May 1997
Tracking excited-state charge and spin dynamics in iron coordination complexes journal May 2014
Communication: X-ray absorption spectra and core-ionization potentials within a core-valence separated coupled cluster framework journal November 2015
Large-Area Three-Dimensional Molecular Ordering of a Polymer Brush by One-Step Processing journal November 2010
The multilevel CC3 coupled cluster model journal July 2016
Analytic CCSD(T) second derivatives journal September 1997
Solvent effects on the ultrafast nonradiative deactivation mechanisms of thymine in aqueous solution: Excited-state QM/MM molecular dynamics simulations journal December 2013
The Dalton quantum chemistry program system: The Dalton program
  • Aidas, Kestutis; Angeli, Celestino; Bak, Keld L.
  • Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Computational Molecular Science, Vol. 4, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1002/wcms.1172
journal September 2013
The equation of motion coupled‐cluster method. A systematic biorthogonal approach to molecular excitation energies, transition probabilities, and excited state properties journal May 1993
On the Intrinsic Population of the Lowest Triplet State of Thymine journal October 2007
Dynamics of Hollow Atom Formation in Intense X-Ray Pulses Probed by Partial Covariance Mapping journal August 2013
Coherent Multidimensional Optical Probes for Electron Correlations and Exciton Dynamics: From NMR to X-rays journal April 2009
Advances in molecular quantum chemistry contained in the Q-Chem 4 program package journal September 2014
Molecular Orbital Interpretation of X‐Ray Emission Spectra: Simple Hydrocarbons and Carbon Oxides journal June 1970
Spin—Orbit Coupling and the Radiationless Processes in Nitrogen Heterocyclics journal June 1963
Real-Time Observation of Surface Bond Breaking with an X-ray Laser journal March 2013
Coupled-cluster theory in quantum chemistry journal February 2007
Photophysics and Deactivation Pathways of Thymine journal September 2008
The CC3 model: An iterative coupled cluster approach including connected triples journal February 1997
Nonradiative Deactivation Mechanisms of Uracil, Thymine, and 5-Fluorouracil: A Comparative ab Initio Study journal December 2011
Excited state dynamics of DNA bases journal June 2013
Imaging Molecular Motion: Femtosecond X-Ray Scattering of an Electrocyclic Chemical Reaction journal June 2015
Reversible Photomechanical Switching of Individual Engineered Molecules at a Metallic Surface journal July 2007
The Soft X-ray Research instrument at the Linac Coherent Light Source journal April 2015
Relaxation mechanisms of UV-photoexcited DNA and RNA nucleobases journal November 2010
Understanding the modulation mechanism in resonance-enhanced multiphoton probing of molecular dynamics journal March 2015
First lasing and operation of an ångstrom-wavelength free-electron laser journal August 2010
Molecular Structural Dynamics Probed by Ultrafast X-Ray Absorption Spectroscopy journal March 2010
Photophysics of the π,π* and n,π* States of Thymine: MS-CASPT2 Minimum-Energy Paths and CASSCF on-the-Fly Dynamics journal September 2009
X-Ray Diffraction from Isolated and Strongly Aligned Gas-Phase Molecules with a Free-Electron Laser journal February 2014
X-ray pulse preserving single-shot optical cross-correlation method for improved experimental temporal resolution journal March 2012
Experimental strategies for optical pump – soft x-ray probe experiments at the LCLS journal April 2014
Ab Initio Molecular Dynamics and Time-Resolved Photoelectron Spectroscopy of Electronically Excited Uracil and Thymine journal August 2007
Probing Ultrafast Internal Conversion through Conical Intersection via Time-Energy Map of Photoelectron Angular Anisotropy journal August 2009
A liquid flatjet system for solution phase soft-x-ray spectroscopy journal August 2015
Dynamics of Light Harvesting in Photosynthesis journal May 2009
Diffractive imaging of a rotational wavepacket in nitrogen molecules with femtosecond megaelectronvolt electron pulses journal April 2016
Intrinsic Lifetimes of the Excited State of DNA and RNA Bases journal November 2002
Can coupled-cluster theory treat conical intersections? journal July 2007
Electronic relaxation dynamics in DNA and RNA bases studied by time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy journal January 2004
Analytic energy gradients for the equation‐of‐motion coupled‐cluster method: Implementation and application to the HCN/HNC system journal March 1994
Response functions in the CC3 iterative triple excitation model journal November 1995
Orbital-specific mapping of the ligand exchange dynamics of Fe(CO)5 in solution journal April 2015
High-resolution inner-shell spectroscopies of free atoms and molecules using soft-x-ray beamlines at the third-generation synchrotron radiation sources journal February 2003
Discerning vibronic molecular dynamics using time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy journal September 1999
The Interplay between ππ*/nπ* Excited States in Gas-Phase Thymine: A Quantum Dynamical Study journal May 2011
DNA Excited-State Dynamics: From Single Bases to the Double Helix journal May 2009
Time-resolved imaging of purely valence-electron dynamics during a chemical reaction journal April 2011
Quantum Mechanical Studies on the Photophysics and the Photochemistry of Nucleic Acids and Nucleobases journal March 2016
Conical intersection dynamics of the primary photoisomerization event in vision journal September 2010
Ultrafast X-ray Auger probing of photoexcited molecular dynamics journal June 2014
Orbital-specific mapping of the ligand exchange dynamics of $Fe(CO)_{5}$ in solution text January 2015
X-Ray Diffraction from Isolated and Strongly Aligned Gas-Phase Molecules with a Free-Electron Laser text January 2014
Time-resolved X-ray absorption spectroscopy with a water-window high-harmonic source conference June 2017
Reversible Photomechanical Switching of Individual Engineered Molecules at a Surface text January 2006
Beyond structure: ultrafast X-ray absorption spectroscopy as a probe of non-adiabatic wavepacket dynamics journal January 2016
Attosecond Dynamics in Liquids preprint January 2020

Cited By (31)

Valence Photoionization of Thymine: Ionization Energies, Vibrational Structure, and Fragmentation Pathways from the Slow to the Ultrafast journal October 2019
Conical-intersection dynamics and ground-state chemistry probed by extreme-ultraviolet time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy journal August 2018
The photochemical ring-opening of 1,3-cyclohexadiene imaged by ultrafast electron diffraction journal April 2019
Tunable isolated attosecond X-ray pulses with gigawatt peak power from a free-electron laser journal December 2019
Femtosecond-resolved observation of the fragmentation of buckminsterfullerene following X-ray multiphoton ionization journal September 2019
UV-induced long-lived decays in solvated pyrimidine nucleosides resolved at the MS-CASPT2/MM level journal January 2018
Photophysics of indole upon X-ray absorption journal January 2018
UV absorption spectra of DNA bases in the 350–190 nm range: assignment and state specific analysis of solvation effects journal January 2019
Exploring the capabilities of optical pump X-ray probe NEXAFS spectroscopy to track photo-induced dynamics mediated by conical intersections journal January 2020
An efficient first principles method for molecular pump-probe NEXAFS spectra: Application to thymine and azobenzene journal October 2018
Molecular inner-shell photoabsorption/photoionization cross sections at core-valence-separated coupled cluster level: Theory and examples journal June 2019
Spin adapted implementation of EOM-CCSD for triplet excited states: Probing intersystem crossings of acetylacetone at the carbon and oxygen K-edges journal October 2019
Time-resolved near-edge X-ray absorption fine structure of pyrazine from electronic structure and nuclear wave packet dynamics simulations journal September 2019
Roadmap of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics journal January 2018
Coherent multidimensional spectroscopy in the gas phase journal August 2019
A strong enhancement in electronic current due to conical-intersection journal September 2019
Transient absorption spectroscopy using high harmonic generation: a review of ultrafast X-ray dynamics in molecules and solids
  • Geneaux, Romain; Marroux, Hugo J. B.; Guggenmos, Alexander
  • Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Vol. 377, Issue 2145 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2017.0463
journal April 2019
X-ray Raman scattering: a building block for nonlinear spectroscopy journal April 2019
Photochemical pathways in nucleobases measured with an X-ray FEL
  • Wolf, Thomas J. A.; Gühr, Markus
  • Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Vol. 377, Issue 2145 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2017.0473
journal April 2019
Development of ultrafast capabilities for X-ray free-electron lasers at the linac coherent light source
  • Coffee, Ryan N.; Cryan, James P.; Duris, Joseph
  • Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Vol. 377, Issue 2145 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2018.0386
journal April 2019
Imaging CF 3 I conical intersection and photodissociation dynamics with ultrafast electron diffraction journal July 2018
Hole dynamics in a photovoltaic donor-acceptor couple revealed by simulated time-resolved X-ray absorption spectroscopy text January 2019
Roadmap of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics text January 2019
Photophysics of indole upon X-ray absorption text January 2018
Conical-intersection dynamics and ground-state chemistry probed by extreme-ultraviolet time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy text January 2018
Valence Photoionization of Thymine: Ionization Energies, Vibrational Structure, and Fragmentation Pathways from the Slow to the Ultrafast text January 2019
Hole dynamics in a photovoltaic donor-acceptor couple revealed by simulated time-resolved X-ray absorption spectroscopy journal July 2019
Roadmap of ultrafast x-ray atomic and molecular physics text January 2018
Photophysics of indole upon x-ray absorption text January 2018
Attosecond Transient Absorption Spooktroscopy: a ghost imaging approach to ultrafast absorption spectroscopy text January 2019
An Assessment of Different Electronic Structure Approaches for Modeling Time-Resolved X-ray Absorption Spectroscopy text January 2021