SHORT-RANGE FORCE EFFECTS IN SEMI-CLASSICAL MOLECULAR LINE BROADENING CALCULATIONS

A semiclassical theory of the width and shift of isolated infrared and Raman lines in the gas phase is developed within the impact approximation. A parabolic trajectory model determined by the isotropic part of the interaction potential allows a satisfactory treatment to be made of the close collisions leading to an analytical expression for the elastic collision cross section. A numerical test of this theory has been made for HCl-Ar by comparing the present results to those of previous infinite order treatments using numerical curved classical trajectories. Extension to the diatom-diatom collisions is then made by expressing the anisotropic potential using an atom-atom interaction model which takes both the long and short range contributions into account. Numerical applications have been performed for the Raman line widths of pure N//2, CO//2 and CO and for the infrared line widths of pure CO and of CO perturbed by N//2 and CO//2. A good quantitative agreement with experiments is obtained for all the considered cases and a correct variation of the broadening coefficient with the rotational quantum number is achieved in opposition to the previous results. A consistent variation of the line broadening with temperature is also obtained even for high rotational levels.