[Todos] PhD studentship in femtosecond photochemistry at UCL (fwd)

[Horacio Grinberg]

Hola a atodos:
 	Reenvio este mensaje por si hay algun potencial interesado.
Saludos,
Horacio Grinberg


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 17 Jul 2007 12:41:23 +0100
From: Helen Fielding <h.h.fielding en UCL.AC.UK>
To: MOLECULAR-DYNAMICS-NEWS en JISCMAIL.AC.UK
Subject: PhD studentship in femtosecond photochemistry at UCL

University College London offers a PhD position:

Time-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy and coherent control with strong
lasers

Helen Fielding (Chemistry) and Jonathan Underwood (Physics and Astronomy)

The aim of this project is to unravel and control the dynamics of
femtosecond, photoinduced photochemistry in the gas-phase using a
combination of femtosecond pulse-shaping technology and coherent control,
molecular alignment and time-resolved photoelectron imaging.

Applicants should have at least a 2.1 MSci in chemistry, physics or related
discipline. Funding is available for citizens of the UK or for citizens of
some EU countries who have been resident in the UK for at least 3 years.
Funding is not available for non EU citizens.

Further information about the research groups can be found at
www.chem.ucl.ac.uk/people/fielding and www.ucl.ac.uk/phys/amopp

Until 10th August, contact Dr Jonathan Underwood (j.underwood en ucl.ac.uk or
tel. 020 7679 2564). After 10th August, contact Professor Helen Fielding
(h.h.fielding en ucl.ac.uk or tel. 020 7679 5575).

Background

Scientists have been attempting to exploit the coherence properties of laser
light to selectively control chemical reactivity since the 1960s. Early
attempts to control mode selectivity by exciting specific bonds failed
because the energy put into a bond was redistributed very rapidly within the
molecule. In the 1980s it became apparent that femtosecond lasers were the
ideal tools to study, and potentially control, chemical bond making and
breaking. In the last decade it has become technologically possible to
engineer complex femtosecond laser fields that can be employed to manipulate
chemical bond making and breaking. What exactly can be learnt from a
time-resolved femtosecond experiment is totally dependent on the probe
scheme. Time-resolved photoelectron imaging (TRPEI) has recently emerged as
an extremely powerful technique for mapping out ultrafast dynamical
processes in the gas phase across the entire reaction coordinate. In these
experiments the photoelectron angular distribution (PAD) reflects the
angular momentum of the molecule at the point of ionization. The form of the
PAD is often highly complicated, and information is lost when the PAD is
measured in the laboratory frame due to the inherent averaging over all
molecular orientations that occurs for gas phase molecules. It is therefore
desirable to measure the PAD in the molecular frame to avoid this loss of
information. A central goal of this project will be to develop techniques
that employ strong non-resonant laser fields to create field-free molecular
axis alignment at the point of ionization.











Helen Fielding
Department of Chemistry
University College London
20 Gordon Street
London WC1H 0AJ
Tel: 020 7679 5575 (office), 1101 (lab)
www.chem.ucl.ac.uk/people/fielding



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