“…7 In these techniques, the pump process prepares the sample in a well de-fined initial rotational state, while the probe stage monitors the evolution of the population to other rotational states as a function of the delay ͑i.e., the number of collisions͒ between the pump and the probe. Several techniques have been used to prepare the state-selected sample, the most relevant being direct absorption of laser radiation, [8][9][10][11][12][13] the stimulated Raman effect [14][15][16][17] and stimulated emission pumping. 18 The literature shows many combinations of these pump methods with a variety of probe techniques: transient IR absorption, 8,9,13 laser-induced UV 14,19 or IR 8,9 fluorescence ͑LIF͒, resonant enhanced multiphoton ionization ͑REMPI͒, 17,15 coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering ͑CARS͒, 20 etc.…”