The photochemical decarbonylation of diphenylcyclopropenone (DPCP) to diphenylacetylene (DPA) proceeds with remarkable efficiency both in solution and in the crystalline solid state. It had been previously shown that excitation to the second electronic excited state (S2) of DPCP in solution proceeds within ca. 200 fs by an adiabatic ring- opening pathway to yield the S2 state of DPA, which has a lifetime of ca. 8 ps before ...