Attosecond spectroscopy reveals secrets of electron movement in molecules

The international team led by Mauro Nisoli and comprising researchers from the Politecnico di Milano, CNR-IFN and CNR-ISM, the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and the Sincrotrone di Trieste, has captured the first moments of charge transfer in a molecule after interaction with attosecond pulses.

They were able to measure how quickly an electron moves from one atom to the adjacent chemical bond, and the structural changes undergone by the molecule in the same ultra-fast time interval.