TY - JOUR
T1 - S2-S0 Spectroscopy of Azulene and Its 2-Chloro, 2-Methyl, and 1,3-Dimethyl Derivatives
AU - Abou-Zied, Osama K.
AU - Sinha, Hemant K.
AU - Steer, Ronald P.
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors gratefully acknowledge the continuing financial support of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. We are also grateful to one of the referees of an earlier manuscript (reference 26) who drew our attention to some additional interesting features of the spectroscopy of azulene. We thank Drs. Irvine and Majewski of our department for their synthesis of MAz and DMAz.
PY - 1997/5
Y1 - 1997/5
N2 - The laser-induced S2-S0 fluorescence excitation and dispersed emission spectra of azulene and three azulene derivatives of C2v skeletal symmetry, 2-chloro-, 2-methyl-, and 1,3-dimethylazulene, have been measured under ultracold, isolated conditions in a supersonic expansion. The FT-IR spectra of the derivatives have been measured, and the ground state vibrational frequencies have been calculated, with scaling, from the force fields by an ab initio method at the RHF/ CEP-31G level for all four compounds to aid in the assignments of these spectra. To achieve global consistency, the vibrational assignments of the ground and second excited singlet states of azulene have required refinement; the reassignments have implications for the vibronic and vibrational coupling models used in existing interpretations of its S2-S0 spectra and the S2 photophysics. The results suggest that small changes of the energy gap between the S2 and S1 states which result from substitutions in the ring produce large changes in both the S2-S0 fluorescence excitation spectra and the photophysics of azulene. Substitution at the 2-position accelerates the rate of radiationless relaxation, whereas this rate remains nearly unaffected by substitution at the 1,3-positions when compared with azulene itself. The threshold for intramolecular vibrational redistribution is significantly reduced in the methyl-substituted azulenes, consistent with an increase in the density of coupled states.
AB - The laser-induced S2-S0 fluorescence excitation and dispersed emission spectra of azulene and three azulene derivatives of C2v skeletal symmetry, 2-chloro-, 2-methyl-, and 1,3-dimethylazulene, have been measured under ultracold, isolated conditions in a supersonic expansion. The FT-IR spectra of the derivatives have been measured, and the ground state vibrational frequencies have been calculated, with scaling, from the force fields by an ab initio method at the RHF/ CEP-31G level for all four compounds to aid in the assignments of these spectra. To achieve global consistency, the vibrational assignments of the ground and second excited singlet states of azulene have required refinement; the reassignments have implications for the vibronic and vibrational coupling models used in existing interpretations of its S2-S0 spectra and the S2 photophysics. The results suggest that small changes of the energy gap between the S2 and S1 states which result from substitutions in the ring produce large changes in both the S2-S0 fluorescence excitation spectra and the photophysics of azulene. Substitution at the 2-position accelerates the rate of radiationless relaxation, whereas this rate remains nearly unaffected by substitution at the 1,3-positions when compared with azulene itself. The threshold for intramolecular vibrational redistribution is significantly reduced in the methyl-substituted azulenes, consistent with an increase in the density of coupled states.
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U2 - 10.1006/jmsp.1996.7252
DO - 10.1006/jmsp.1996.7252
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:0012396347
SN - 0022-2852
VL - 183
SP - 42
EP - 56
JO - Journal of Molecular Spectroscopy
JF - Journal of Molecular Spectroscopy
IS - 1
ER -