Nitroimidazole exhibits a remarkable regioselective fragmentation subsequent to valence ionization, which is characterized by ejection of NO. As NO is also considered to be an effective radiosensitizer, we investigated its production efficiency as a function of isomeric composition (the site of the NO 2 nitro group). We observe strong dependence in the 8.6−15 eV binding energy range, and moreover, that the production of NO can be effectively suppressed by methylation of nitroimidazole. This behavior can be understood by modification of the valence electronic structure with respect to the dissociation threshold, which gives rise to varying effective density of dissociative states. We find the NO yield to follow the efficiency of the nitroimidazole dervivatives as radiosensitizers, found in preclinical studies.

Soft-x-ray free-electron-laser pulses were used to create highly charged molecular tetrabromothiophene species by sequential multiphoton ionization from bromine 3d orbitals. The experiment was performed at the SACLA facility in Japan and the products of molecular dissociation were analyzed by means of multicoincidence momentum-resolved ion time-of-flight spectroscopy. Total charge states up to +13 atomic units were produced, creating a particular dissociation pattern for the carbon ions, a Coulomb implosion, due to the concerted forces by the surrounding heavy bromine ions. This behavior was explored both experimentally and by numerical molecular-dynamics simulations and the fingerprints of the Coulomb implosion were identified in both. In simulations, Coulomb implosion was predicted to be highly sensitive to the initial (thermal) motion of the atoms and, after including vibrational motion for several temperatures, good general agreement between the experiment and simulations was found. The agreement with the experiment was further improved by adding charge dynamics to the simulation, according to our point-charge dynamics model with empirical rate constants.

Correlations between the ion momenta are extracted by covariance methods formulated for the use in multiparticle momentum-resolved ion time-of-flight spectroscopy.

The chemical bond scission of methylbenzoate (C6H5CO2CH3) following core excitation at the C and O K edges was examined from partial ion yield measurements across these edges using synchrotron radiation. Site-specific scission of the C-O bonds was observed at both edges. Theoretical X-ray absorption spectra (XAS) were obtained using density functional theory. Peak assignments in the observed spectra were found to be consistent with the theory. From core-excited state dynamics calculations, an elongation of the C-O bond was predicted and provides an explanation of the observed partial ion yield enhancement of CH3+ and C6H5CO+ at the core-excited resonances at both edges.