Knowledge Bank

The $CF3NO$ molecule is a blue gas with a weak absorption from 520 to 720 nm that occurs by the promotion of a nitrogen nonbonding electron to the No antibonding orbital. We report on analysis of the torsional levels of the ground state and first excited singlet state of $CF3NO$. The energies of the torsional quanta and barrier heights were by analysis of laser excited fluorescence emission and fluorescence excitation spetra. The excited electronic state exists as a single conformer in the straggered configuration and the overall transition from the eclipsed ground state to staggered excited state yields extensive overlapping absorption structure that is analyzed by fluorescence. The fluorescence lifetimes depend on the torsional level because of a competing radiationless process and we comment on the torsional dependence of this process.