A new sensitive detection scheme for helium nanodroplet isolation spectroscopy: application to benzene

A new method is presented for recording excitation spectra of molecules embedded in helium nanodroplets. The method relies on the complete evaporation of the droplets following excitation of a dissolved molecule and the subsequent detection of the remaining unsolvated molecule by mass spectrometry. The technique has been successfully applied to record the S1 1B(2u) <-- S0 1A(1g) transition in benzene. The transition frequencies determined by this new method, beam depletion spectroscopy and REMPI spectroscopy have been found to differ slightly from each other. It is argued that these differences in transition frequency are related to the different droplet sizes probed by the spectroscopic techniques.