Open AccessElectron Diffraction of Pyrene Nanoclusters Embedded in Superfluid Helium Droplets
Author(s) -
Lei Lei,
Yuzhong Yao,
Jie Zhang,
Dale E. Tronrud,
Wei Kong,
Chengzhu Zhang,
Lan Xue,
Léo Dontot,
Mathias Rapacioli
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
the journal of physical chemistry letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.563
H-Index - 203
ISSN - 1948-7185
DOI - 10.1021/acs.jpclett.9b03603
Subject(s) - nanoclusters , pyrene , electron diffraction , superfluid helium 4 , diffraction , molecule , helium , electron , superfluidity , chemistry , materials science , molecular physics , chemical physics , crystallography , nanotechnology , condensed matter physics , physics , optics , organic chemistry , quantum mechanics
We report electron diffraction of pyrene nanoclusters embedded in superfluid helium droplets. Using a least-squares fitting procedure, we have been able to separate the contribution of helium from those of the pyrene nanoclusters and determine the most likely structures for dimers and trimers. We confirm that pyrene dimers form a parallel double-layer structure with an interlayer distance of 3.5 Å and suggest that pyrene trimers form a sandwich structure but that the molecular planes are not completely parallel. The relative contributions of the dimers and trimers are ∼6:1. This work is an extension of our effort of solving structures of biological molecules using serial single-molecule electron diffraction imaging. The success of electron diffraction from an all-light-atom sample embedded in helium droplets offers reassuring evidence of the feasibility of this approach.