- Email: [email protected]
Photo selective chemistry, part 2
136
can then traverse regions of the potential energy surface away from those corresponding to the reaction co-ordinate; regions of the surface corresponding to interactions between the unrearranged reactant or product molecules, are related to transport properties and elastic and inelastic differential cross section measurements. In the last few years, therefore, a vast body of experimental data has accumulated, and there have been corresponding developments in theoretical techniques. Complete, ab initio calculation of the potential energy surface, for systems other than the very simple, still eludes us, and evidently will do so for the forseeable future, but striking successes have been achieved by the use of judiciously-chosen approximations such as the Diatomics-in-Molecules method. The present book provides a timely and welcome survey of this rapidly evolving field. Although each of its ten chapters is written by a different author or pair of authors, the amount of overlap between them is small, and the whole is nicely coordinated by a generous twenty-five pages long Index section. Each chapter is a specialist review article, and a wide range of topics is covered. The semi-empirical calculation of ground-state potential energy surfaces is reviewed by Tully. Biittcher discusses the corresponding problem for excited states. Applications to reacting systems are described by Menzinger (Electronic Chemiluminescence in Gases) and Lin (Dynamics of Oxygen Atom Reactions). Other collisional effects are considered by Freed (Collisional Effects on Electronic Relaxation Processes), DePristo and Rabitz (Vibrational and Rotational Collision Processes), Loesch (Scattering of Non-spherical Molecules), and Lacmann (Collisional Ionization). The remaining chapters are by Le Roy and Carley (van der Waals Molecules), and Diestler (Vibrational Relaxation of Small Molecules in Dense Media). Potential Energy Surfaces, like the other members of the Advances in Chemical Physics Series, is written and produced to high standards. It contains a very large amount of information with numerous suggestions for further investigations, and it is certain to stimulate new research in this field. B. J. McC. Chemistry, Part 2, edited by Joshua Jortner, Raphael D. Levine, and Stuart A. Rice, Series on Advances in Chemical Physics, Vol. 47, Wiley-Interscience, Chichester, 1981, pp. xii + 718, price 244.55.
Photo Selectiue
The term “Photoselective Chemistry” is used by the editors as being “concerned with the influence of selective optical excitation on the acquisition, storage and dispersal of energy and on the reactivity of molecules, in both gaseous and condensed phases.” The aim of these volumes (of which this is the second) is partly “to develop an integrated approach to the interpretation of observations already made and to the development and exploitation of
137
these for new approaches to photochemistry”. There are five sections, the second volume containing section 3 on One-Photon and Two-Photon Photoselective Chemistry (153 pp, 7 articles), section 4 on Studies of Collision Effects (pp. 183 to 381, 5 articles), and finally section 5 on Studies in Condensed Media (pp. 419 to 643, 7 articles). There are author and subject indexes, as is usual in this series. An integrated approach to such a range of subject matter must surely be achieved through the medium of theoretical effort. Indeed the editors themselves mention in their preface the intense theoretical activity which has been stimulated by the increased use of lasers as sources and probes down to the picosecond time scale. The use of similar theoretical methods across the range of fields covered by these volumes, and the use of lasers, are the two readily identifiable common denominators. Otherwise the contents are heterogenous, ranging from, for example, laser enhanced diffusion cloud reactions (Eyal, Agam and Grabiner), to an article by Rentzepis and Barbara concerned with proton transfer in rhodopsin (pp. 627 to 643). A reviewer is naturally attracted by an article in his own field of speciality, and one of these in my case is by Oxtoby on vibrational population relaxation in liquids, concerned mainly with the rapid and incisive theoretical advances of the last decade in this and the field of molecular liquid studies generally. The four sections of this article are concerned with respectively introduction, theories for vibrational relaxation, experimental studies of vibrational relaxation and non-Markovian effects on vibrational relaxation. The advantages of a coordinated approach show up clearly in an article such as this because of the relative ease with which theory developed for other fields (such as far infra-red broad-band absorption) can be adapted to interpret the new types of picosecond time-resolved data now proliferating. A decade’s experience in the field of liquid state spectroscopy, using a variety of techniques, has shown that coordination is the password to a deeper appreciation of the subject as a whole. The editor’s aim is therefore an admirable one, but I am not sure whether it can be achieved by specialist publications alone. The price of volume 2 alone ($44.55) is usually beyond the means of the interested individual and libraries therefore have the responsibility of making this excellent series accessible to readers. M. W. E.
Vibrational Spectroscopy of Molecular Liquids and Solrds, NATO Advanced Study Institutes Series, Series B: Physics, Vol. 56, edited by S. Bratos and
R. M. Pick, Plenum Press, New York, 1980, pp. ix + 464, price $49.50. In the last decade, fascinating progress has occurred in the field of vibrational spectroscopy of molecular liquids and of solids. So far, however, the development of these two fields has taken place independently. For this reason a Summer School of Vibrational Spectroscopy of Molecular
can then traverse regions of the potential energy surface away from those corresponding to the reaction co-ordinate; regions of the surface corresponding to interactions between the unrearranged reactant or product molecules, are related to transport properties and elastic and inelastic differential cross section measurements. In the last few years, therefore, a vast body of experimental data has accumulated, and there have been corresponding developments in theoretical techniques. Complete, ab initio calculation of the potential energy surface, for systems other than the very simple, still eludes us, and evidently will do so for the forseeable future, but striking successes have been achieved by the use of judiciously-chosen approximations such as the Diatomics-in-Molecules method. The present book provides a timely and welcome survey of this rapidly evolving field. Although each of its ten chapters is written by a different author or pair of authors, the amount of overlap between them is small, and the whole is nicely coordinated by a generous twenty-five pages long Index section. Each chapter is a specialist review article, and a wide range of topics is covered. The semi-empirical calculation of ground-state potential energy surfaces is reviewed by Tully. Biittcher discusses the corresponding problem for excited states. Applications to reacting systems are described by Menzinger (Electronic Chemiluminescence in Gases) and Lin (Dynamics of Oxygen Atom Reactions). Other collisional effects are considered by Freed (Collisional Effects on Electronic Relaxation Processes), DePristo and Rabitz (Vibrational and Rotational Collision Processes), Loesch (Scattering of Non-spherical Molecules), and Lacmann (Collisional Ionization). The remaining chapters are by Le Roy and Carley (van der Waals Molecules), and Diestler (Vibrational Relaxation of Small Molecules in Dense Media). Potential Energy Surfaces, like the other members of the Advances in Chemical Physics Series, is written and produced to high standards. It contains a very large amount of information with numerous suggestions for further investigations, and it is certain to stimulate new research in this field. B. J. McC. Chemistry, Part 2, edited by Joshua Jortner, Raphael D. Levine, and Stuart A. Rice, Series on Advances in Chemical Physics, Vol. 47, Wiley-Interscience, Chichester, 1981, pp. xii + 718, price 244.55.
Photo Selectiue
The term “Photoselective Chemistry” is used by the editors as being “concerned with the influence of selective optical excitation on the acquisition, storage and dispersal of energy and on the reactivity of molecules, in both gaseous and condensed phases.” The aim of these volumes (of which this is the second) is partly “to develop an integrated approach to the interpretation of observations already made and to the development and exploitation of
137
these for new approaches to photochemistry”. There are five sections, the second volume containing section 3 on One-Photon and Two-Photon Photoselective Chemistry (153 pp, 7 articles), section 4 on Studies of Collision Effects (pp. 183 to 381, 5 articles), and finally section 5 on Studies in Condensed Media (pp. 419 to 643, 7 articles). There are author and subject indexes, as is usual in this series. An integrated approach to such a range of subject matter must surely be achieved through the medium of theoretical effort. Indeed the editors themselves mention in their preface the intense theoretical activity which has been stimulated by the increased use of lasers as sources and probes down to the picosecond time scale. The use of similar theoretical methods across the range of fields covered by these volumes, and the use of lasers, are the two readily identifiable common denominators. Otherwise the contents are heterogenous, ranging from, for example, laser enhanced diffusion cloud reactions (Eyal, Agam and Grabiner), to an article by Rentzepis and Barbara concerned with proton transfer in rhodopsin (pp. 627 to 643). A reviewer is naturally attracted by an article in his own field of speciality, and one of these in my case is by Oxtoby on vibrational population relaxation in liquids, concerned mainly with the rapid and incisive theoretical advances of the last decade in this and the field of molecular liquid studies generally. The four sections of this article are concerned with respectively introduction, theories for vibrational relaxation, experimental studies of vibrational relaxation and non-Markovian effects on vibrational relaxation. The advantages of a coordinated approach show up clearly in an article such as this because of the relative ease with which theory developed for other fields (such as far infra-red broad-band absorption) can be adapted to interpret the new types of picosecond time-resolved data now proliferating. A decade’s experience in the field of liquid state spectroscopy, using a variety of techniques, has shown that coordination is the password to a deeper appreciation of the subject as a whole. The editor’s aim is therefore an admirable one, but I am not sure whether it can be achieved by specialist publications alone. The price of volume 2 alone ($44.55) is usually beyond the means of the interested individual and libraries therefore have the responsibility of making this excellent series accessible to readers. M. W. E.
Vibrational Spectroscopy of Molecular Liquids and Solrds, NATO Advanced Study Institutes Series, Series B: Physics, Vol. 56, edited by S. Bratos and
R. M. Pick, Plenum Press, New York, 1980, pp. ix + 464, price $49.50. In the last decade, fascinating progress has occurred in the field of vibrational spectroscopy of molecular liquids and of solids. So far, however, the development of these two fields has taken place independently. For this reason a Summer School of Vibrational Spectroscopy of Molecular