Ultraviolet (UV) photoelectron spectroscopy provides a direct way of measuring valence electronic structure; however, its application to aqueous solutions has been hampered by a lack of quantitative understanding of how inelastic scattering of low energy electrons (< 6 eV) in liquid water distorts the measured electron kinetic energy distributions. We have developed a method for retrieving true UV photoelectron spectra of aqueous solutions [1]. In this talk, I will discuss our method and how we have applied it to retrieve information about the electronic structure and photooxidation dynamics of aqueous solutions of biologically relevant organic molecules [1,2].

[1]   M. S. Scholz, W. G. Fortune, O. Tau and H. H. Fielding, under review, 2022.
[2]   O. Tau, A. Henley, A. N. Boichenko, N. N. Kleshchina, R. Riley, B. Wang, D. Winning, R. Lewin, J..M. Ward, I. P. Parkin, H. C. Hailes, A. V. Bochenkova, and H. H. Fielding, Nature Commun. 2022 13, 507.