Ejection of Clusters from Liquid Beam Surface by IR Laser Irradiation

Abstract

AbstractA continuous liquid flow of an aqueous solution of phenol (Phe) in a vacuum (a liquid beam) was irradiated with an IR laser at 2.85 μm, which is resonant to the vibrational absorption band of the liquid water. The Phe (H2O)N, ejected from the liquid beam surface into the gas phase, was ionized by a UV laser at 270 nm into hydrated phenol cluster ions, Phe+ (H2O)n (n = 0 − 30), and analyzed by a time‐of‐flight mass spectrometer. The velocity distributions of the product cluster ions were derived from the spatial distributions measured at different elapsed times after the IR laser irradiation. The results and the analysis show that dense neutral clusters are ejected from surface regions locally heated by the intense IR laser.