Collision induced dissociation of doubly charged stored metal cluster ions

Abstract

Singly charged noble metal cluster ions from an external laser vaporization source are accumulated in a Penning trap. They are subjected to electron bombardment for further ionization. The doubly charged clusters are size selected and their low energy fragmentation pathways are studied by multiple-collision-induced dissociation. The reaction products are analysed by time-of-flight detection. In general, large clusters tend to evaporate neutral atoms while small clusters fission into two singly charged fragments, one of which is a trimer. The details, however, vary and depend on the specific elements and cluster sizes as exemplified by the fragmentation of doubly charged copper, silver, gold and platinum clusters of size around n = 16. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.