Energy distributions in the HF and CO products of the reaction of F atoms with HCO

Abstract

The initial energy distributions in both products of the title reaction have been measured using a variant of the low-pressure infrared chemiluminescence technique. The vibrational populations of both products decrease with increasing vibrational level, indicating of the formation of a long-lived HFCO intermediate. The HF vibrational population is well represented by a (restricted phase space) statistical calculation. The CO vibrational excitation is considerably colder than this calculation predicts. These results, combined with ab initio reaction coordinate calculations suggest that free exchange of energy among the modes of the HFCO intermediate ceases early in the exit channel. Thereafter, an excess of energy is partitioned into relative translation of the products.