The Vura-Weis Lab tour

The Vura-Weis lab measures electron transfer and reactivity in systems containing multiple heavy atoms at femtosecond to nanosecond timescales. The central thesis of our group is that by combining the ultrafast time resolution of femtosecond lasers with the element specificity of core-to-valence spectroscopy, we can measure short-lived states that are obscured using traditional spectroscopic techniques. Using a process called high-harmonic generation, we convert near-infrared laser pulses into extreme ultraviolet (XUV) pulses in the 30-100 eV energy range. This technique has primarily been developed in the physics and chemical physics communities, and it is the goal of our group to extend its use to mainstream problems in physical and inorganic chemistry. Our major scientific targets are shown in Figure 1: molecular photocatalysis with bimetallic metal complexes, photomagnetism and photoinduced spin crossover, and organohalide perovskite photovoltaics. These systems are an order of magnitude more complex than the usual targets of XUV spectroscopy, so this work requires innovations in both instrumentation and interpretation