Photoelimination of C2H2 and H2 from styrene at 193 nm

In this letter, we report the photodissociation of styrene at 193 nm by product translational spectroscopy. The results show that the molecule undergoes predominantly molecular elimination of C2H2 and H2 with a branching ratio C2H2/H2≈7. In addition, a secondary dissociation channel from the internally excited C6H6 product was identified. Product translational energy distributions were measured for all reaction channels. The lack of the product anisotropy is consistent with previous investigations that fragment separation occurred after structural rearrangement.