Collisional Energy Transfer Measurements in Vibrationally Excited OH

氢原子与臭氧的反应在v=5和9之间的振动能级上产生羟基自由基（OH）。这种反应自然发生在中间层的上部区域，由振动激发的OH产生强烈的红外荧光。在这个高度区域，发射的强度和光谱取决于振动激发氢氧根的辐射和碰撞性质。在先前的资助下，PI开发了新的基于激光的方法来测量这些高振动激发自由基的速率常数和弛豫路径。在该基金支持的工作中，这项新技术将用于确定具有大气重要性的OH速率常数，并直接适用于中间层中受激发OH所遇到的条件。这些实验在技术上具有挑战性，但实验技术已被证明是可行的，并且可以提取重要的定量测量。

The reaction of hydrogen atoms with ozone generates hydroxyl radicals (OH) in vibrational levels between v=5 and 9. This reaction occurs naturally in the upper region of the mesophere, generating strong infrared flourescence from the vibrationally excited OH. In this altitude region, the intensity and spectrum of the emission depend on both the radiative and the collisional properties of the vibrationally excited OH. Under a previous grant the PI developed new laser-based methods of measuring the rate constants and relaxation pathways of these highly vibrationally excited radicals. In the work supported by this grant the new technique will be applied to determining OH rate constants that are at atmospheric importance and directly applicable to the conditions encountered by the excited OH in the mesosphere. These experiments are technically challenging, but the experimental technique has been shown to be feasible, and important quantitative measurements can be extracted.