Assignment text
The purchase of the HARPIA-TA Ultrafast Spectroscopy Extension from Light Conversion will be used to investigate molecular reaction dynamics. The devise will be integrated into an existing laser setup to provide ultrafast measurements of photoreactions and excited state dynamics. The HARPIA-TA is the only device on the market with the ability to fully integrate into the existing Light Conversion Pharos laser setup.
The customer is an associate professor at the Chemistry Department of Aarhus University and head of the surface spectroscopy facility SurfLab. We intend to extend our existing Pharos laser setup with a HARPIA-TA Ultrafast Spectroscopy Extension for a planned research project.
Reactions, chemical conversion and excited state dynamics all take place at molecular timescales – femtoseconds to picosconds. The properties and performance of an active material is in large parts determined by these processes. Typical examples include catalysis, nucleation, photoreactions, quantum oscillations and electron transfer. However, relative to static, steady-state properties, it is extremely challenging to obtain information at ultrafast timescales about molecular structure, molecular motion and energy transfer. Ultrafast pump probe spectroscopy can provide this information and has proven to be a reliable tool to probe ultrafast molecular processes. For a pump probe experiment it is required to prepare trains of femtosecond laser pulses across a wide range of wavelengths using an optical parametric amplifier (OPA) with exquisite control of temporal spacing, relative phase and spectral shape to drive, pump, a chemical reaction. Then a synchronous train of broad-band pulses must be generated as the UV/VIS probe. It is a requirement for the planned experiments, that the pump pulse energy must be tunable without any gaps between 2 micometers and 210 nanometers. Since the experiment will be offered as a facility for outside users, it is a minimum requirement that the setup integrates fully with the existing experiment and that the alignment of the pulse preparation can be done electronically and be maintained by the vendor with online access. The setup must be extendable to meet future user needs such as microscopy modules and additional beam options.
The Customer has performed a systematic search for commercially available pulse shapers. The HARPIA-TA in combination with an ORPHEUS NEO is the only instrument available on the market offering the integration, performance and hands-off reliability needed for successful operation. The HARPIA-TA provides us with extremely high-performance pump and probe pulses as well as the fully integrated data acquisition and analysis options needed to visualize molecular reactions, motions and energy transfer with unprecedented detail.