Electron - impact spectroscopy of acetaldehydea >

Acetaldehyde has been studied by the technique of low-energy variable-angle electron energyloss spectroscopy. With this method the low-lying spin-forbidden transitions have been located via the behavior of the relative differential cross sections, providing the first identification by this technique of such states in acetaldehyde. High-lying states were also investigated and some assignments of dipole symmetry-forbidden/quadrupole symmetry-allowed excitations were made on the basis of characteristic angular behavior, evident for the asymmetric molecule acetaldehyde just as for the symmetric molecules formaldehyde and acetone. Through a comparison of the acetaldehyde results with those for formaldehyde and acetone the trends in the allowed and forbidden transition energies were examined as a function of methyl substitution and found to be relatively linear.