Optical dephasing in organic amorphous systems. A photon echo and hole‐burning study of pentacene in polymethylmethacrylate

Probing dynamics of complex molecular systems with ultrafast 2D IR vibrational echo spectroscopy

Ultrafast 2D IR vibrational echo spectroscopy is described and a number of experimental examples are given. Details of the experimental method including the pulse sequence, heterodyne detection, and determination of the absorptive component of the 2D spectrum are outlined. As an initial example, the 2D spectrum of the stretching mode of CO bound to the protein myoglobin (MbCO) is presented. The time dependence of the 2D spectrum of MbCO, which is caused by protein structural evolution, is presented and its relationship to the frequency-frequency correlation function is described and used to make protein structural assignments based on comparisons to molecular dynamics simulations. The 2D vibrational echo experiments on the protein horseradish peroxidase are presented. The time dependence of the 2D spectra of the enzyme in the free form and with a substrate bound at the active site are compared and used to examine the influence of substrate binding on the protein's structural dynamics. The application of 2D vibrational echo spectroscopy to the study of chemical exchange under thermal equilibrium conditions is described. 2D vibrational echo chemical exchange spectroscopy is applied to the study of formation and dissociation of organic solute-solvent complexes and to the isomerization around a carbon-carbon single bond of an ethane derivative.

Fast protein dynamics probed with infrared vibrational echo experiments

IR vibrational echo experiments are used to study dynamics in myoglobin (Mb) by investigating the dephasing of the CO-stretching mode of CO bound at the active site of the protein (Mb-CO). The temperature dependence and the viscosity dependence of Mb-CO pure dephasing have been measured in several solvents. In low-temperature, glassy solvents, the pure dephasing has a power law temperature dependence, T(1.3), that reflects glasslike protein dynamics. In liquids, the temperature dependence is much steeper and arises from a combination of pure temperature dependence and the influence of decreasing solvent viscosity with increasing temperature. As the solvent viscosity decreases, the ability of the protein's surface to undergo topological fluctuations increases, which in turn increases the internal protein-structural fluctuations. The protein-structural motions are coupled to the CO bound at the active site by electric field fluctuations that accompany movements of polar residues. The dynamic electric field-coupling mechanism is tested by observing differences in the temperature dependence of the pure dephasing of Mb-CO mutations.

Hole-Burning Spectroscopy and Relaxation Dynamics of Amorphous Solids at Low Temperatures

The magnitude and temperature dependence of most of the properties of amorphous solids are anomalous at very low temperatures ( less, similar1 Kelvin). Phonon-assisted tunneling of a distribution of glassy bistable configurations, or two-level systems, can account for these anomalies. A unified understanding of the low-temperature properties is required for an understanding of the glassy state. Persistent nonphotochemical hole burning of impurity optical transitions allows a glass state to be produced that is thermally inaccessible to the preburn state, and that allows the probing of tunneling dynamics on time scales that range between picoseconds and days. These data combined with recently obtained distribution functions for the two-level systems offer new insights into the tunneling dynamics.