Structure of C3 as measured by the Coulomb-explosion technique

The structure of the neutral C3 molecule (of interest in connection with the spectroscopic study of comets) was investigated on the basis of the Coulomb-explosion technique with a new type of detection system. The detection system allows for the first time the simultaneous determination of the velocity vectors of all the nuclei involved without introduction of any bias depending on geometry or orientation. This makes it possible to derive the correlation between internal degrees of freedom in the molecules. (B.J.)