Injecting Electrons into CeO via Photoexcitation of Embedded Au Nanoparticles.

The electron injection efficiency and the steady state absorptance at different photon energies for a composite system made of Au NPs embedded in a cerium oxide matrix are reported. Cerium oxide can be coupled with plasmonic nanoparticles (NPs) to improve its catalytic properties by visible-light absorption. The present work is a study of the ultrafast dynamics of excited states induced by ultraviolet and visible-light excitation in Au NPs combined with cerium oxide, aimed at understanding the excitation pathways.

Adsorption and Dissociation of -Methyl -Tolyl Sulfoxide on Au(111).

Sulfur-based molecules producing self-assembled monolayers on gold surfaces have long since become relevant functional molecular materials with many applications in biosensing, electronics, and nanotechnology. Among the various sulfur-containing molecules, the possibility to anchor a chiral sulfoxide to a metal surface has been scarcely investigated, despite this class of molecules being of great importance as ligands and catalysts. In this work, ()-(+)-methyl -tolyl sulfoxide was deposited on Au(111) and investigated by means of photoelectron spectroscopy and density functional theory calculations.

PECD study of a single-conformer molecule: a critical comparison of experiment and theory.

In this work we address a specific experimental and theoretical question regarding the influence of a conformational population in the modeling of photoelectron circular dichroism (PECD) spectroscopy. In the past two decades, PECD has revealed a rich and complex phenomenology in molecular processes with unprecedented insight, especially in molecular geometry sensitivity. Since the early development of this spectroscopy, theory has pointed out the importance of conformer influence on PECD; in particular, the rotation of methyl groups was surprisingly found to be responsible for strong modulation of the PECD signal.

Excited state dynamics of Zn-salophen complexes.

Zn-salophen complexes are a promising class of fluorescent chemosensors for nucleotides and nucleic acids. We have investigated, by means of steady state UV-Vis, ultrafast transient absorption, fluorescence emission and time dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT) the behavior of the excited states of a salicylidene tetradentate Schiff base (Sal), its Zn(II) coordination compound (Zn-Sal) and the effect of the interaction between Zn-Sal and adenosine diphosphate (ADP). TD-DFT shows that the deactivation of the excited state of Sal occurs through torsional motion, due to its rotatable bonds and twistable angles.

Fragmentation dynamics of doubly charged camphor molecule following C 1s Auger decay.

The fragmentation dynamics of the gas-phase, doubly charged camphor molecule, formed by Auger decay following carbon 1s ionisation, using soft X-ray synchrotron radiation, is presented in this work. The technique of velocity map imaging combined with a photoelectron-photoion-photoion coincidence (VMI-PEPIPICO) is used for both electron energy and ion momentum (in-sequence) measurements. The experimental study is complemented by molecular dynamics simulation, performed with an (moles, volume, and temperature) ensemble.