COULOMB EXPLOSION DYNAMICS OF N2O IN INTENSE LASER-FIELD - IDENTIFICATION OF NEW 2-BODY AND 3-BODY FRAGMENTATION PATHWAYS

The Coulomb explosion process of N2O in an intense laser-field (simila r to 5 PW/cm(2)) has been investigated by the high-resolution time-of- flight (TOF) spectroscopy. Six two-body explosion pathways involving t he NO+, NO2+, N-2(+) molecular ions have been securely identified from the momentum-scaled TOF spectra of the fragment ions. Assuming a line ar geometry, three-body explosion pathways were investigated by sequen tial and concerted explosion models, When the concerted model is adopt ed, the observed momentum distributions of six atomic ion channels; N, N2+, N3+, O+, O2+ and O3+, were well fitted using the Gaussian momen tum distribution with the optimized bond elongation factor of 2.2(3). From the yields of individual Coulomb explosion pathways determined by the fit, the abundance of the parent ions, N2Oz+ (z = 2-8), prior to the two- body and three-body explosion processes was found to have a s mooth distribution with a maximum at z similar to 3.