Authors: G Gavrila K Godehusen C Weniger E T J Nibbering T Elsaesser W Eberhardt P Wernet
Publish Date: 2009/05/05
Volume: 96, Issue: 1, Pages: 11-18
Abstract
A timeresolved Xray absorption study of the structural dynamics of liquid water on a picosecond timescale is presented We apply femtosecond midinfrared pulses to resonantly excite the intramolecular O–H stretching band of liquid water and monitor the transient response in the oxygen Kedge absorption spectrum with picosecond Xray pulses In this way structural changes in the hydrogen bond network of liquid water upon an ultrafast temperature jump of approximately 20 K are investigated The changes of the Xray absorption as induced by such a temperature jump are about 32 This demonstrates that our method serves as a sensitive probe of transient structural changes in liquid water and that combined infraredlaser–synchrotron experiments with substantially shorter Xray pulses such as generated with a femtosecond slicing scheme are possible
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