Cluster isolated chemical reactions

Abstract

The study of chemical reactions in clusters is a rapidly growing field that is attractive for investigating medium effects in reaction dynamics. Cluster isolated chemical reaction (CICR) is a new direction developed in our laboratory, which enables quantitative studies to be made in that field. CICR experiments consist in depositing a controlled number of reactants on large van der Waals clusters that play the role of a solvent of fairly well known size, structure and temperature. This offers enormous advantages, both on the experimental side and for further theoretical investigations. The present review intends to draw together informations that are pertinent for developing experiments and concepts towards understanding chemical reactions in clusters, through CICR-type experiments. In particular, it reviews the questions first of generating and controlling the properties of large van der Waals clusters and secondly of attaching reactants to clusters and controlling their number and location in the cluster. Besides reviewing thoroughly the CICR work done so far in our laboratory, the present paper also reviews part of the vast literature pertaining to reaction dynamics in large van der Waals clusters.