Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry<\/a>.<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Clark_thumbnail.jpg\")
Rachel Weiss, a graduate student in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry<\/p>\n
When molecules absorb energy from light, that energy has to go somewhere. Sometimes it causes a chemical reaction. In other cases, it dissipates as heat or radiates light back; that is, it glows.<\/p>\n
But ligand-to-metal charge transfer molecules didn\u2019t behave as expected. When combined with other reactive materials and exposed to light, they produced chemical reactions, but at much lower efficiency than expected. They also didn\u2019t radiate much heat or light. That posed a mystery: where was the energy from that light going?<\/p>\n
The answer: the electron configuration within the material was moving. Instead of breaking chemical bonds, the electrons rearranged to move to a lower energy state.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhenever you give something a lot of energy, the thing that it wants to do is get rid of it,\u201d said co-author Rachel Weiss, a graduate researcher. \u201cThe two ways that this system has is to either break the bond or rearrange its electrons, and it just tends to go in the rearranging pathway much more often.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the examples the researchers examined, molecules rearranged their electrons in about 85% of cases.<\/p>\n
![\"Blue\/UV](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Experiment.jpg\")
The lasers used by researchers in the study. The image shows the blue\/UV light used to excite the sample in their ultrafast experiments. (Courtesy of Rachel Weiss)<\/p>\n
The electron-rearrangement pathway doesn\u2019t directly allow for more efficient reactions in applied settings such as manufacturing. But understanding how this reaction works is crucial for future research that could lead to more efficient chemical processing.<\/p>\n
\u201cRight now, we don\u2019t know what determines the path these molecules use, but it implies we can make these reactions five or ten times faster,\u201d Kudisch said.<\/p>\n
In the context of pharmaceutical manufacturing, for example, in which companies are producing millions of doses of medicine for patients, cutting the time for a single reaction represents a major increase in efficiency.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe economics of making a molecule depends on how much time is needed for a reaction to occur,\u201d he said. \u201cThe faster your reactions are, the more products you can make.\u201d<\/p>\n
The research was supported by the American Chemical Society Petroleum Research Fund and by FSU.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An illustration showing a bond breakage like those examined by FSU researchers in this study. This is an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":128154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[56742,57786,28,30,29],"class_list":["post-128153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-college-of-arts-and-sciences","tag-department-of-chemistry-and-biochemistry","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"An](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Research.jpg\")
An illustration showing a bond breakage like those examined by FSU researchers in this study. This is an example of a tetrachloroferrate molecule (FeCl4-) being excited with a UV lamp, releasing a chlorine atom. (Courtesy of Rachel Weiss Clark)![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Kudisch_thumbnail.jpg\")
Bryan Kudisch, an assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry<\/p>\n