NEAR-THRESHOLD ELECTRON ENERGY-LOSS (0-9 EV) AND OPTICAL-ABSORPTION (5-11.8 EV) SPECTROSCOPY OF TRIFLUORONITROSOMETHANE (CF3NO)

The number of known electronic transitions in trifluoronitrosomethane (CF3NO) has been extended using VUV absorption and near-threshold electron energy-loss (EEL) spectroscopy. The lowest triplet (T1) state has been located at ca. 1.1 eV (ca. 1130 nm), ca. 0.7 eV below the corresponding singlet (S1) state. An optical absorption at ca. 8.8 eV (ca. 140 nm) is assigned to excitation of the pi-pi-* state; other VUV bands at 7.7 (ca. 160 nm) and 6.4 eV (ca. 195 nm) are tentatively assigned n-3s and n+pi-*, respectively, where n- and n+ are antisymmetric and symmetric combinations of N and O lone-pair orbitals, respectively. Dissociative electron attachment is observed at ca. 0, 1 and 6.2 eV.