Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-chemistry-course-of-the-year-3-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2022/paper-2b/section-b/34/d/i/solution

The strong band is the vibrational fundamental, and the weaker band near twice its wavenumber is the first vibrational overtone. At room temperature these high-frequency oscillators have overwhelmingly ground-state vibrational populations. In the harmonic-potential, linear-dipole limit the infrared selection rule is ; anharmonicity and nonlinear dipole dependence make the overtone weakly allowed. A hot band would lie near, and slightly below, the fundamental wavenumber, rather than near twice it.

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