Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 19, 2025

Coulomb Explosion Imaging as a Tool to Distinguish Between Stereoisomers
Published on: August 18, 2017
Precision Measurement of the Electron Affinity of Chlorine via High-Resolution Photoelectron Spectroscopy
Shuaiting Yan1, Rui Zhang1, Chuangang Ning1
1Department of Physics, State Key Laboratory of Low Dimensional Quantum Physics, Frontier Science Center for Quantum Information, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China.
Abstract:
Chlorine (Cl2) is a diatomic molecule used as an important industrial gas. However, the electron affinity (EA) of Cl2, a fundamental parameter for understanding chemical reactions, has no accurate experimental result available. The latest result of the EA value of Cl2 is 2.50(20) eV reported in 1983. In the present work, we report the precision measurement of the EA of Cl2 with the successive difference method via the high-resolution photoelectron spectroscopy of cryogenically cold chlorine anions Cl2-. The EA of Cl2 is determined to be 19432(9) cm-1 or 2.4093(11) eV.
Related Concept Videos
Electron Affinity
Atomic Mass
Atomic Emission Spectroscopy: Lab
Mass Spectrometry: Alkyl Halide Fragmentation
Electronegativity
Atomic Emission Spectroscopy: Interference

