In this project in the Physical Chemistry program of the Chemistry Division, Prof. L. Peteanu of the Carnegie-Mellon University will explore the possibilities of a combined Stark-Raman effect to investigate vibrational mode couplings in the neighborhood of the curve crossings of excited electronic states. The Stark-Raman technique would provide an ability to determine the effect of an (external) electric perturbing field on the vibrational displacements in the excited states of photochemically active molecules. Previous attempts to observe the influence of an externally impressed field on the Raman spectrum of a molecule were unsuccessful and this field has lain dormant for more than 40 years. The present research is to explore this essentially unknown field. With the superior theoretical and experimental techniques that are now available, there are valid expectations that a new area of molecular spectroscopy will be developed. If sucessful, the Stark-Raman technique will be useful in situations where the usual techniques of infrared absorption and resonance Raman spectroscopy are inadequate.
