Eur. Phys. J. D 35, 199-205 (2005)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2005-00089-5

Electron attachment to strongly polar clusters

Formamide molecule and clusters

¹ Laboratoire de Physique des Lasers, UMR7538, Institut Galilée, Université Paris 13, 93405 Villetaneuse, France
² DER de Physique, Faculté des Sciences et techniques, Bamako, BPE3206, Mali
³ Dipartimento di Chimica, “G. Ciamician”, Universita di Bologna, via Selmi 2, 40126 Bologna, Italy and Centro Interdipartimentale di Ricerca in Scienze Ambientali (CIRSA), via S. Alberto163, 48100 Ravenna, Italy

Corresponding author: ^a scherman@galilee.univ-paris13.fr

Received: 11 March 2005
Published online: 14 June 2005

Abstract

Electron localization is studied in formamide cluster anions. The isolated formamide molecule has a large dipole moment and its clusters can give birth to multipole-bound anions as well as valence anions. The vertical valence electron affinity of the isolated molecule is determined by electron transmission spectroscopy. The anion formation process is studied as a function of cluster size with Rydberg electron transfer spectroscopy. DFT calculations of the neutral and negatively-charged cluster structures show that the anion excess electron localizes on a single molecule. The adiabatic valence electron affinity of isolated formamide is deduced from the observation of the cluster size threshold for valence attachment.