Hierarchical analysis of molecular spectra

A novel representation of molecular spectra in terms of hierarchical trees has proven to be an important aid for the study of many significant problems in gas-phase chemical dynamics. Trees are generated from molecular spectra by monitoring the changes that occur in a spectrum as resolution is changed in a continuous manner. A tree defines a genealogy among all lines of a spectrum. This allows for a detailed understanding of the assignment of features of a spectrum that may be difficult to obtain any other way as well as an understanding of intramolecular energy transfer time scales, mechanisms, and pathways. The methodology has been applied to several problems: transition state spectroscopy, intramolecular energy transfer in highly excited molecules, high-resolution overtone spectroscopy, and the nature of the classical-quantum correspondence when there is classical chaos (``quantum chaos``)