Photoelectron photoion coincidence spectroscopy

Photoelectron photoion coincidence spectroscopy (PEPICO) is a combination of photoionization mass spectrometry and photoelectron spectroscopy. Free molecules from a gas-phase sample are ionized by incident vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) radiation. In the ensuing photoionization, a cation and a photoelectron are formed for each sample molecule. The mass of the photoion is determined by time-of-flight mass spectrometry, whereas, in current setups, photoelectrons are typically detected by velocity map imaging. Electron times-of-flight are three orders of magnitude smaller than ion ones, which means that the electron detection can be used as a time stamp for the ionization event, starting the clock for the ion time-of-flight analysis. In contrast with pulsed experiments, such as REMPI, in which the light pulse must act as the time stamp, this allows to use continuous light sources, e.g. a discharge lamp or a synchrotron light source. No more than several ion–electron pairs are present simultaneously in the instrument, and the electron–ion pairs belonging to a single photoionization event can be identified and detected in delayed coincidence.