Photofragment slice imaging studies of pyrrole and the Xe⋯pyrrole cluster

Abstract

The photolysis of pyrrole has been studied in a molecular beam at wavelengths of 250, 240, and 193.3 nm, using two different carrier gases, He and Xe. A broad bimodal distribution of H-atom fragment velocities has been observed at all wavelengths. Near threshold at both 240 and 250 nm, sharp features have been observed in the fast part of the H-atom distribution. Under appropriate molecular beam conditions, the entire H-atom loss signal from the photolysis of pyrrole at both 240 and 250 nm (including the sharp features) disappear when using Xe as opposed to He as the carrier gas. We attribute this phenomenon to cluster formation between Xe and pyrrole, and this assumption is supported by the observation of resonance enhanced multiphoton ionization spectra for the (Xe...pyrrole) cluster followed by photofragmentation of the nascent cation cluster. Ab initio calculations are presented for the ground states of the neutral and cationic (Xe...pyrrole) clusters as a means of understanding their structural and energetic properties.