Formation and Decomposition of Chemically Activated and Stabilized Hydrazine

Abstract

Recombination of two amidogen radicals, NH(2) (X(2)B1), is relevant to hydrazine formation, ammonia oxidation and pyrolysis, nitrogen reduction (fixation), and a variety of other N/H/X combustion, environmental, and interstellar processes. We have performed a comprehensive analysis of the N(2)H(4) potential energy surface, using a variety of theoretical methods, with thermochemical kinetic analysis and master equation simulations used to treat branching to different product sets in the chemically activated NH(2) + NH(2) process. For the first time, iminoammonium ylide (NH(3)NH), the less stable isomer of hydrazine, is involved in the kinetic modeling of N(2)H(4). A new, low-energy pathway is identified for the formation of NH(3) plus triplet NH, via initial production of NH(3)NH followed by singlet-triplet intersystem crossing. This new reaction channel results in the formation of dissociated products at a relatively rapid rate at even moderate temperatures and above. A further novel pathway is described for the decomposition of activated N(2)H(4), which eventually leads to the formation of the simple products N(2) + 2H(2), via H(2) elimination to cis-N(2)H(2). This process, termed as "dihydrogen catalysis", may have significant implications in the formation and decomposition chemistry of hydrazine and ammonia in diverse environments. In this mechanism, stereoselective attack of cis-N(2)H(2) by molecular hydrogen results in decomposition to N(2) with a fairly low barrier. The reverse termolecular reaction leading to the gas-phase formation of cis-N(2)H(2) + H(2) achieves non-heterogeneous catalytic nitrogen fixation with a relatively low activation barrier (77 kcal mol(-1)), much lower than the 125 kcal mol(-1) barrier recently reported for bimolecular addition of H(2) to N(2). This termolecular reaction is an entropically disfavored path, but it does describe a new means of activating the notoriously unreactive N(2). We design heterogeneous analogues of this reaction using the model compound (CH(3))(2)FeH(2) as a source of the H(2) catalyst and apply it to the decomposition of cis-diazene. The reaction is seen to proceed via a topologically similar transition state, suggesting that our newly described mechanism is general in nature.