Picosecond time-resolved infrared absorption measurements of CO/Cu(100) following visible and ultraviolet laser pumping allow a determination of the time scales for photoexcited carriers and lattice phonons to couple to the CO frustrated translation vibrational mode.PACS numbers: 68.35.Ja, 42.62.Fi, 63.20.Kr, 78.47.+p Since low frequency vibrational modes of adsorbates are the precursors to motion about and away from a surface, energy transfer through these modes plays important roles in a wide range of interface processes. For example, calculations of surface diffusion rely upon knowledge of the frictional damping rates of frustrated translations [1], Reactions between molecules on neighboring sites rely on activation of these modes to bring the molecules together. Recently, the field of femtosecond surface photochemistry has opened up a realm of novel interactions of molecules with nonequilibrium substrate degrees of freedom. Ultimately, an understanding of these processes requires knowledge of the various pathways by which the low frequency modes can couple to the substrate degrees of freedom [2][3][4][5]. However, the low cross sections for optical absorption and the lack of available time-resolved spectroscopies at these frequencies have prevented the direct measurement of the lifetimes of these modes.By observing the vibrational response of an adsorbate during ultrashort laser heating of a substrate, the time scales and mechanisms for surface-molecule energy transfer can be revealed. In this Letter, time-resolved measurements of the transient response of CO/Cu(100) to picosecond laser excitation are presented. Unlike previous measurements of substrate-adsorbate coupling strengths [6], these results unambiguously establish the contribution of transiently heated substrate electrons and phonons in activating the low frequency adsorbate vibrational modes and allow the coupling times of the frustrated translational mode to hot carriers and phonons to each be determined.The 0.5 monolayer (ML) (1 ML=7.67xl0 14 cm" 2 ) (V5xV2)/?45° overlayer of CO on Cu(100) at 100 K has been well characterized in terms of both adsorbate vibrational modes and low lying unoccupied electronic states. The electronic levels of the system have been characterized using inverse photoemission, indicating two unoccupied levels centered at 2.6 and 3.6 eV above the Fermi level, related to the CO 53=285 cm" 1 , and the frustrated translation at V4 = 32 cm" 1 . We have made independent steady state IRAS measurements [12] on the same crystal used for the time-resolved experiments, determining the temperature dependence of the CO stretch mode vi =2086-0.031 [T(K) -100] cm" 1 and width 8v x =3.9 + 0.005[r(K)-100] cm" 1 . This behavior is readily accounted for by dephasing of ...