Abstract

The role of internal energy in the scattering of molecular beams from surfaces has recently attracted much attention.^1-3 Most of these experiments however are confined to the scattering of molecules distributed over the lowest few rotational levels of the ground vibrational state. In the experiments presented here, laser spectroscopic techniques are utilized to perform state-to-state molecular beam scattering experiments. Two laser beams intersect the molecular beam: tunable infrared laser radiation excites the incident molecular beam to a single vibrational-rotational state then tunable ultraviolet laser radiation state-selectively probes the molecular beam through two photon resonance enhanced ionization. The beam of vibrationally excited molecules is well defined in time allowing the direct determination of velocity distributions for a laser-selected state by taking time-of-flight spectra at various probe laser positions. We report here the angular and velocity distribution of vibrationally excited molecules that we have observed surviving the collision with a freshly cleaved LiF(100) surface.

© 1985 Optical Society of America