Rotational excitation and the energy distribution of CN(B 2Σ) produced by the reaction of metastable Ar( 3P 0,2) atoms with HCN

Abstract

The violet emission spectrum (B 2ΣX 2Σ) of the CN radical observed by the collision of HCN with metastable Ar( 3P 0,2) atoms was analyzed. The effective rotational temperature of the CN(B 2Σ) radical, as estimated from a band envelope analysis, is about 2000°K. The distributions of the excess energy to vibration, rotation and translation are found to be 1.2 ± 0.2, 0.2 and 1.9 ± 0.3 eV, respectively.