Infrared Predissociation Spectroscopy of Large Water Clusters: a Unique Probe of Cluster Surfaces.

• The vibrational OH-stretch spectra of large water clusters were measured by photofragment spectroscopy after the absorption of pulsed tunable infrared radiation in the frequency range from 3000 to 3800 cm-1. The mean size of the clusters from = 20 to 1960 was measured by threshold photoionization of the water clusters doped with sodium atoms. The largest abundance of the fragments was that of water hexamers. The fragment intensities are measured for different excitation energies and different cluster temperatures as function of the cluster size. For the selected sizes = 48, 111, 631, and 1960 complete OH-stretch spectra have been measured. The comparison with calculations revealed that the method is mainly sensitive to the outer cluster surface which has for all sizes an amorphous structure dominated by 3-coordinated and to a lesser extent also by 4-coordinated molecules. The intensity of the hexamer fragments goes through a maximum at n = 70 and drops to n = 300 where it levels off with a different slope. This behavior is attributed to the number of available connected 3-coordinated water molecules and the influence of the emerging 4-coordinated molecules in these clusters.

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NATURVETENSKAP  -- Kemi -- Fysikalisk kemi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Chemical Sciences -- Physical Chemistry (hsv//eng)

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