Rate coefficients for the reaction of methylglyoxal (CH<sub>3</sub>COCHO) with OH and NO<sub>3</sub> and glyoxal (HCO)<sub>2</sub> with NO<sub>3</sub>

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Abstract. Rate coefficients, k, for the gas-phase reaction of CH3COCHO (methylglyoxal) with the OH and NO3 radicals and (CHO)2 (glyoxal) with the NO3 radical are reported. Rate coefficients for the OH + CH3COCHO (k1) reaction were measured under pseudo-first-order conditions in OH as a function of temperature (211–373 K) and pressure (100–220 Torr, He and N2 bath gases) using pulsed laser photolysis to produce OH radicals and laser induced fluorescence to measure its temporal profile. k1 was found to be independent of the bath gas pressure with k1(295 K) = (1.29 ± 0.13) × 10−11 cm3 molecule−1 s−1 and a temperature dependence that is well represented by the Arrhenius expression k1(T) = (1.74 ± 0.20) × 10−12 exp[(590 ± 40)/T] cm3 molecule−1 s−1 where the uncertainties are 2σ and include estimated systematic errors. Rate coefficients for the NO3 + (CHO)2 (k3) and NO3 + CH3COCHO (k4) reactions were measured using a relative rate technique to be k3(296 K) = (4.0 ± 1.0) × 10−16 cm3 molecule−1 s−1 and k4(296 K) = (5.1 ± 2.1) × 10−16 cm3 molecule−1 s−1. k3(T) was also measured using an absolute rate coefficient method under pseudo-first-order conditions at 296 and 353 K to be (4.2 ± 0.8) × 10−16 and (7.9 ± 3.6) × 10−16 cm3 molecule−1 s−1, respectively, in agreement with the relative rate result obtained at room temperature. The atmospheric implications of the OH and NO3 reaction rate coefficients measured in this work are discussed.