https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/s10053-025-01057-z
Regular Article - Atoms, Molecules, Ions, and Clusters
Comparing electron scattering by cis- and trans-hydroquinone: elastic cross sections and shape resonances
Departamento de Física, Universidade Federal do Paraná, Caixa Postal 19044, 81531-980, Curitiba, Paraná, Brazil
Received:
7
August
2025
Accepted:
22
August
2025
Published online:
11
September
2025
Quinones are ubiquitous in the biological media. Here, we present elastic integral, differential and momentum transfer cross sections for low-energy electron scattering from the cis- and trans-conformers of hydroquinone (HQ). These cross sections were computed using the Schwinger multichannel method with pseudopotentials in the static exchange and static exchange plus polarization approximations, up to 12 eV. The main distinction between the two conformers is the presence of strong long-range dipole–electron interactions in cis-HQ, which are absent in trans-HQ due to its nonpolar nature. Three resonances were identified for both conformers: The first two correspond to the lowest degenerate 
resonance of benzene, while the third exhibits a mixed shape and core-excited character. Comparison with dissociative electron attachment experiments suggests that fragmentation likely occurs via an indirect 
internal conversion pathway for fragments observed at low impact energies. These results provide new cross-sectional data that may support the modeling of electron-driven processes in biologically relevant environments.
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Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
