Conformer specific nonadiabatic reaction dynamics in the photodissociation of partially deuterated thioanisoles (CHS-CHD and CHS-CHD).

In this work, we have investigated nonadiabatic dynamics in the vicinity of conical intersections for predissociation reactions of partially deuterated thioanisole molecules: CHS-CHD and CHS-CHD. Each isotopomer has two distinct rotational conformers according to the geometrical position of D or H of the methyl moiety with respect to the molecular plane for CHS-CHD or CHS-CHD, respectively, as spectroscopically characterized in our earlier report [J. Lee, S.-Y. Kim and S. K. Kim, J. Phys. Chem. A, 2014, 118, 1850]. Since identification and separation of two different rotational conformers of each isotopomer have been unambiguously done, we could interrogate nonadiabatic dynamics of thioanisole in terms of both H/D substitutional and conformational structural effects. Nonadiabatic transition probability, estimated by the experimentally measured branching ratio of the nonadiabatically produced ground-state channel giving CHS·(X[combining tilde]) versus the adiabatic excited-state channel leading to the CHS·(Ã) radical, shows resonance-like increases at symmetric (ν) or asymmetric (7a) S-CHD (or S-CHD) stretching mode excitation in S for all conformational isomers of two isotopomers. However, absolute probabilistic value of the nonadiabatic transition is found to vary quite drastically depending on different conformers and isotopomers. The experimental finding that nonadiabatic transition dynamics are very sensitive to subtle changes in the nuclear configuration within the Franck-Condon region induced by the H/D substitution indicates that the S/S conical intersection seam is quite narrowly defined in the multi-dimensional nuclear configurational space as far as the S-methyl predissociation reaction is concerned. In order to understand the relation between molecular structure and nonadiabaticity of reaction, potential energy surfaces near S/S conical intersections have been theoretically calculated along ν and 7a normal mode coordinates for all conformational isomers. Slow-electron velocity map imaging (SEVI) spectroscopy is employed to unravel the extent of intramolecular vibrational redistribution (IVR) for particular mode excitations of S, providing insights into the dynamic interplay between IVR and nonadiabatic transition probability near the conical intersection seam.