Multiphoton tea CO 2 laser excitation of the triplet state of propynal

Abstract

Multiple infrared photon excitation of propynal triplet molecules gives rise to a strongly perturbed phosphorescence. Following absorption of a few IR photons per molecule the phosphorescence spectrum extends to higher energy, the intensity increases, the decay — deviating from the original exponential decay — accelerates and the emission quantum yield drops dramatically. These findings are explained in terms of temperature sensitive radiative (T 1 → S 0) and radiationless (T 1 → S 0) processes with the vibrational temperature as the determining factor. During the perturbed triplet decay, the IR excitation initially confined to the vibrational degrees of freedom becomes distributed among all degrees of freedom which results in a decrease in the vibrational temperature and thus a complex phosphorescence decay.