Electron momentum spectroscopy study of thiophene: Binding energy spectrum and valence orbital electron density distributions

Electron momentum spectroscopy has been used to measure the binding energy spectrum and momentum distributions of the valence orbitals of thiophene, which are compared with Hartree-Fock and density functional theory calculations using different-sized basis sets. Impact energy of 1200 eV plus binding energy and symmetric non-coplanar kinematics are employed. The measured binding energy spectra are compared and consistent with PES data available in the literature and also with the predictions of Green's function methods. The agreement between theory and experiment for the shape of the orbital electron momentum distributions is generally good. The satellite structure of the innermost valence orbital 6a₁ is reported.