The Experimental Physical Chemistry Program supports Professor Hanson in an experimental investigation of the various decay channels following soft x-ray excitation of atomic inner shell vacancies in simple gaseous molecules. Basic information is being obtained on the competing energy dissipation processes occuring in these highly excited molecules, especially correlations between electronic decay channels and the resulting chemical transformations. The results may provide guidance to important considerations in the design of x-ray lithography equipment. Tunable and monochromatic soft x-ray radiation from the National Synchrotron Light Source at Brookhaven is used to excite gas phase molecules in the region near the K edge of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, or fluorine or the L edge of silicon, sulfur, phosphorus, or chlorine. Following this very selective internal excitation, information is extracted on the various decay processes using electron spectroscopy, mass spectrometry, and fluorescence techniques, both singly and in coincidence.
