An electronic transition described approximately as
promotion of an electron from a '
bonding' orbital to a
Rydberg orbital. Spectral bands corresponding to Rydberg transitions approximately fit the Rydberg
formula:
where

is the wavenumber,

the
ionization potential of the atom or molecular entity,

a principal quantum number,

the
Rydberg constant, and

the quantum
defect which differentiates between s, p, d, etc., orbitals.
The notation used is, e.g.

.
Source:
PAC, 1996, 68, 2223
(Glossary of terms used in photochemistry (IUPAC Recommendations 1996))
on page 2272
Cite as:
IUPAC. Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 2nd ed. (the "Gold Book"). Compiled by
A. D. McNaught and A. Wilkinson. Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford (1997).
XML on-line corrected version: http://goldbook.iupac.org (2006-) created by M. Nic,
J. Jirat, B. Kosata; updates compiled by A. Jenkins. ISBN 0-9678550-9-8.
https://doi.org/10.1351/goldbook.