(Magnetic) Circular Dichroism Spectroscopy
The Chemistry Department is particularly well equipped with spectrometers for investigating the electronic absorption and emission spectra of molecules in the UV/visible/near-IR region. The optical spectroscopy facility under the direction of Professor Michael Johnson has the capability of measuring absorption, CD, LD, MCD and MLD spectra of samples in UV/visible/near-IR region at any temperature in the range 1.5-350 K, with magnetic fields up to 7 T. The facility comprises a Shimadzu 3100PC UV/visible/near-IR absorption spectrometer with attachments for fixed temperature and reflectance measurements, Jasco J-500C and J-715 UV/visible CD/LD spectrometers, and Jasco J-730 near-IR CD spectrometer. The CD/LD spectrometers are mated to electromagnets or Oxford Instruments superconducting spectromagnets for MCD or MLD measurements at temperatures as low as 1.5 K with magnetic fields up to 7 T. The departmental fluorescence capabilities center around a Spex Fluorolog-2 spectrofluorometer which facilitates measurement of excitation and emission spectra as well as polarization and anisotropy measurements. In individual research labs there are 10 tunable dye laser systems pumped by Nd:YAG, excimer or argon ion lasers for electronic spectroscopy and photochemistry studies, as well as two solid state OPO systems.