Probing strong-field electron-nuclear dynamics of polyatomic molecules using proton motion

Proton ejection during Coulomb explosion is studied for several structure-related organic molecules (anthracene, anthraquinone, and octahydroanthracene) subjected to 800 nm, 60 fs laser pulses at intensities from 0.50 to 4.0x10(14) W cm(-2). The proton kinetic energy distributions are found to be markedly structure specific. The distributions are bimodal for anthracene and octahydroanthracene and trimodal for anthraquinone. Maximum (cutoff) energies of the distributions range from 50 eV for anthracene to 83 eV for anthraquinone. The low-energy mode (similar to 10 eV) is most pronounced in octahydroanthracene. The dependence of the characteristic features of the distributions on the laser intensity provides insights into molecular specificity of such strong-field phenomena as (i) nonadiabatic charge localization and (ii) field-mediated restructuring of polyatomic molecules polarized by a strong laser field.