Assignment of benzodiazepine UV absorption spectra by the use of photoelectron spectroscopy

Correlations between singlet transition energies and energy gaps of corresponding pairs of occupied and unoccupied molecular orbitals were revealed in a series of benzodiazepines. The occupied orbital energies were taken from the photoelectron spectra of the compound investigated, the unoccupied ones were obtained from MNDO/d calculations, and the singlet energies were taken from the UV absorption spectra. The correspondence of the singlet transitions to certain molecular orbitals was established using MNDO/d calculations and comparing between UV and photoelectron spectra. It has been concluded that photoelectron spectroscopy can be applied for interpretation of UV absorption spectra of various compounds on the basis of similar correlations.