Orientational and induced depolarized Rayleigh scattering of some anisotropic molecules in their liquid state

Abstract

The Rayleigh depolarized profiles of three symmetric top molecules, cyclopropane, allene, and benzene, are analysed. It is shown that these profiles cannot be interpreted assuming only orientational fluctuations but can be well reproduced, together with the [Formula: see text] profiles, assuming that they result from a weighted sum of an orientational profile and a damped oscillator profile. The former does not exhibit orientational cooperative effects at room temperature for the three molecules. The shape and intensity of the latter present some characteristics expected for a collision-induced profile.