December 5, 2022
Email office@phys.ksu.edu for the Zoom address
Imaging of ultrafast molecular dynamics with electron diffraction The conversion of light into mechanical and chemical energy, at the level of single molecules, is an essential process that drives chemical reactions such as vision and photosynthesis, and is important for solar energy conversion and storage. After light absorption, changes take place at the atomic level on femtosecond timescales through motion of the nuclei and breaking and making of chemical bonds. Our work focuses on light induced structural dynamics of isolated molecules. Observing structural changes in real time is challenging due to the extremely high requirements on the combined spatial and temporal resolution. We use ultrafast electron diffraction (UED), which probes changes in molecular structure with atomic (sub-Angstrom) resolution, to observe the reaction dynamics. In this presentation we will discuss recent applications of UED to capture coherent nuclear motions and structural rearrangements in molecules