Electronic Excitation of Furan by Low Energy Electrons*

We present absolute differential cross section (DCS) measurements and calculations of electron impact excitation of the lowest lying triplet $^{3}$B$_{2}$ and $^{3}$A$_{1}$ electronic states of furan. The incident electron energy range of the present study was 5-15eV. The experimental data were normalized to the elastic DCS data of [1]. The cross sections were determined by unfolding electron energy loss spectra, using an open source data analysis package and the spectroscopic assignments of [2]. The calculations employ a Multichannel Schwinger method with a 9-state closed coupling CI configuration including polarized pseudo-potentials. The preliminary theoretical results show reasonable agreement with experiment below 10eV, but differ at higher energies. \\[4pt] [1] M. A. Khakoo et al., Phys. Rev. A, 81, 062716 (2010) \\[0pt] [2] A. Guiliani and M.-J. Hubin-Franskin, Int. J. Mass Spec., 205, 163 (2001)