The ortho-to-para conversion in solid hydrogen, catalyzed by hydrogen atoms

Abstract

The combined techniques of ESR and NMR were used to investigate the process of ortho-para conversion in solid molecular hydrogen, containing small amounts (∼ 500 ppm) of hydrogen atoms as impurity. Although the impurity atoms catalyze the effective conversion of the neighboring ortho-H2, the total catalyzed conversion rate at temperatures from 2.2 K to 4.4 K is much less than expected from the rate of the H atoms recombination. A possible explanation is given in terms of the diffusion of H atoms, which is confined to some defects in the crystal.