[MOS] MOS Seminar March 19, 2013

[Luis H Galindo]

Seminar on




Modern Optics and Spectroscopy

Spectroscopic characterization of
transition states

Joshua Baraban,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology


Tuesday, March 19, 2013

12:00 – 1:00 p.m.






Conventional wisdom has always held that transition states are impossible to observe and characterize experimentally.  With the exceptions of ultrafast spectroscopy and ab initio electronic structure calculations, direct information about these critical points on potential energy surfaces has therefore been very limited. We have recently demonstrated for the first time that it is possible to characterize a transition state by high resolution spectroscopic methods, using the cis-trans isomerization in the well-known A state of acetylene as a prototypical system.  New spectroscopic patterns related to the properties of transition states will be discussed, in addition to the experimental and theoretical techniques employed to decipher the complex spectra and dynamics of isomerizing molecules.


Grier Room, MIT Bldg 34-401
Refreshments served after the lecture
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