THE RAMAN AND VIBRONIC ACTIVITY OF INTERMOLECULAR VIBRATIONS IN AROMATIC-CONTAINING COMPLEXES AND CLUSTERS

Theoretical and experimental results pertaining to the excitation of intermolecular vibrations in the Raman and vibronic spectra of aromatic-containing, weakly bound complexes and clusters are reported. The theoretical analysis of intermolecular Raman activity is based on the assumption that the polarizability tensor of a weakly bound species is given by the sum of the polarizability tensors of its constituent monomers. The analysis shows that the van der Waals bending fundamentals in aromatic-rare gas complexes may be expected to be strongly Raman active. More generally, it predicts strong Raman activity for intermolecular vibrations that involve the libration or internal rotation of monomer moieties having appreciable permanent polarizability anisotropies. The vibronic activity of intermolecular vibrations in aromatic-rare gas complexes is analyzed under the assumption that every vibronic band gains its strength from an aromatic-localized transition. It is found that intermolecular vibrational excitations can accompany aromatic-localized vibronic excitations by the usual Franck-Condon mechanism or by a mechanism dependent on the librational amplitude of the aromatic moiety during the course of the pertinent intermolecular vibration. The latter mechanism can impart appreciable intensity to bands that are forbidden by rigid-molecule symmetry selection rules. The applicability of such rules is therefore called into question. Finally, experimental spectra of intermolecular transitions, obtained by mass-selective, ionization-detected stimulated Raman spectroscopies, are reported for benzene-X (X=Ar, -Ar2, N2, HCl, CO 2, and -fluorene), fluorobenzene-Ar and -Kr, aniline-Ar, and fluorene-Ar and -Ar2. The results support the conclusions of the theoretical analyses and provide further evidence for the value of Raman methods in characterizing intermolecular vibrational level structures. © 1994 American Institute of Physics.