Ion rotational distributions for near-threshold photoionization of H2O

Ion rotational distributions for single-photon VUV photoionization of the 1b1 orbital of the X̃ 1A1 ground state of the jet-cooled water are reported. These spectra reveal significant type a transitions which are seen to arise from odd angular momentum components of the photoelectron matrix element. The resulting photoionization dynamics are quite nonatomic-like.