Ultrafast Energy Transfer to Liquid Water by Sub‐Picosecond High‐Intensity Terahertz Pulses: An Ab Initio Molecular Dynamics Study

Abstract

Sub-picosecond heating of bulk water is accomplished by ultrashort and intense THz pulses which are able to transfer a large amount of energy to the liquid. The energy transferred corresponds to a temperature jump of about 600 K. Liquid water becomes a structureless and hot gas-like system still at the density of the liquid, in which the hydrogen-bonding structure has been washed out.