Rotational spectroscopy $n$-propanol: $Aa$ and $Ag$ conformers

Abstract

The primary alcohol $n$-propanol (i.e., $normal$-propanol or propan-1-ol; C${}_3$H${}_7$OH) occurs in five different conformers: $Ga$, $Gg$, $G{g}^{\prime }$, $Aa$, and $Ag$. All rotational spectra of the three conformers of the $G$ family are well described, making astronomical search of their spectroscopic signatures possible, as opposed to those of the $Aa$ and $Ag$ conformers. Our goal is to facilitate the astronomical detection of $Aa$ and $Ag$ conformers of $n$-propanol by characterizing their rotational spectra. We recorded the rotational spectra of $n$-propanol in the frequency domain of 18$-$505\,GHz.Additional double-modulation double-resonance (DM-DR) measurements were performed, more specifically with the goal to unambiguously assign weak transitions of the $Aa$ conformer and to verify assignments of the $Ag$ conformer. We derived a spectroscopic quantum mechanical model with experimental accuracy (with $J_{\text{max}}=70$ and $K_{a,\text{max}}=6$) for $Aa$ $n$-propanol. Furthermore, we unambiguously assigned transitions (with $J_{\text{max}}=69$ and $K_{a,\text{max}}=9$) of $Ag$ $n$-propanol; in doing so, we prove the existence of two tunneling states, $A{g}^{+}$ and $A{g}^{-}$. The astronomical search of all five conformers of $n$-propanol is now possible via their rotational signatures. These are applied in a companion article on the detection of $n$-propanol toward the hot molecular core Sgr B2(N2).

References in corpus (4)

• The ALMA Protostellar Interferometric Line Survey (PILS): First results from an unbiased submillimeter wavelength line survey of the Class 0 protostellar binary IRAS 16293-2422 with ALMA
• Interstellar detection and chemical modeling of iso-propanol and its normal isomer
• Millimeter-millimeter-wave double-modulation double-resonance spectroscopy
• (Sub-)millimeter-wave spectroscopy of gauche-propanal

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Interstellar detection and chemical modeling of iso-propanol and its normal isomer
• Reexploring Molecular Complexity with ALMA: Insights into chemical differentiation from the molecular composition of hot cores in Sgr B2(N2)