Alignment, Orientation, and Coulomb Explosion of Difluoroiodobenzene Studied with the Pixel Imaging Mass Spectrometry (PImMS) Camera

TL;DR

This study uses advanced imaging techniques to investigate how laser fields can align and orient difluoroiodobenzene molecules, revealing detailed Coulomb explosion dynamics with high-resolution detection.

Contribution

It demonstrates the application of the Pixel Imaging Mass Spectrometry (PImMS) camera for simultaneous detection of ions and electrons in molecular alignment and Coulomb explosion experiments.

Findings

Achieved high degrees of molecular alignment and orientation.

Compared Coulomb explosion processes at different wavelengths.

Recorded detailed ion momentum distributions and time-of-flight data.

Abstract

Laser-induced adiabatic alignment and mixed-field orientation of 2,6-difluoroiodobenzene (C6H3F2I) molecules are probed by Coulomb explosion imaging following either near-infrared strong-field ionization or extreme-ultraviolet multi-photon inner-shell ionization using free-electron laser pulses. The resulting photoelectrons and fragment ions are captured by a double-sided velocity map imaging spectrometer and projected onto two position-sensitive detectors. The ion side of the spectrometer is equipped with the Pixel Imaging Mass Spectrometry (PImMS) camera, a time-stamping pixelated detector that can record the hit positions and arrival times of up to four ions per pixel per acquisition cycle. Thus, the time-of-flight trace and ion momentum distributions for all fragments can be recorded simultaneously. We show that we can obtain a high degree of one- and three-dimensional alignment and mixed- field orientation, and compare the Coulomb explosion process induced at both wavelengths.