Collision-induced absorption at wavelengths near 5 μm by dense hydrogen gas

Based on a recent ab initio interaction-induced dipole surface of collisionally interacting molecular hydrogen pairs H-2-H-2, we compute the binary absorption coefficients at wavelengths near 5 mu m at temperatures of 77.5 and 297 K for comparison with existing laboratory measurements. We observe satisfactory agreement of the measurements with our calculations, thereby concluding an earlier study [Gustafsson et al., J. Chem. Phys. 119, 12264 (2003)], which was based on an ab initio interaction-induced dipole surface that was inadequate for the 5 Am band. (C) 2009 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3263609]