Hannover 2010 – wissenschaftliches Programm

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MO: Fachverband Molekülphysik

MO 20: Experimental Techniques I

MO 20.5: Vortrag

Donnerstag, 11. März 2010, 12:00–12:15, F 142

Comparison of fluorescence spectra of tryptamine obtained by thermal vaporization and laser desorption — •Benjamin Stuhlmann and Karl Kleinermanns — Heinrich Heine Universität, Düsseldorf, Institut für Physikalische Chemie

Laser desorption is an alternative to thermal vaporization for experiments in molecular beams.

In this work it is used to probe biomolecules, which can be susceptible to fragmentation at the temperatures needed for thermal vaporization.

The exposition of the probed molecules to heat in a desorption source occurs only for a short time and in a small spatial region determined by the desorption laser spot. In a thermal source, the whole supply of sample is constantly heated.

We used tryptamine as test-molecule for desorption from a graphite surface by a Nd:YAG laser at 1064 nm.

Tryptamine is a monoamine alkaloid found in plants, fungi and animals. It contains an indole-ring as chromophor like the amino-acid tryptophan. Tryptophan is fluorophor in many folded proteins.

This relation -and its suspected role as a neurotransmitter- makes tryptamin a very interesting model system for spectroscopical investigation of biomolecules.

Spectral data of tryptamine after thermal vaporization are available from our group, thus these results could be compared to the spectra obtained after laser desorption.