Control of fragmentation reactions in impulsively aligned polyatomic molecules by selective removal of inner-valence electrons

Recently, selective fragmentation of polyatomic molecules using the carrier-envelope phase (CEP) of few-cycle ionizing laser pulses as the control parameter has been demonstrated. It was shown that the underlying mechanism is selective removal of specific (inner-valence shell) electrons, which puts the molecule into a dedicated dissociative electronic state from which the molecule then fragments along a desired pathway.