STATISTICAL DESCRIPTION OF ROTATIONAL DISTRIBUTIONS OF OH(V,N) FROM THE REACTION O(3P)+HCL(V,J)-]OH+CL

A statistical simulation of the state-to-state experiments by Rakestraw, McKendrick and Zare on the reaction O(3P) + HCl(v, J) → OH(v, N) + Cl is presented, using our statistical algorithm UNIMOL. Good agreement with the experimental rotational distributions has been found by implementing a realistic procedure for the vibrational quantization in the exit channels. The vibrational branching ratio is in fair agreement with experiments. The dominating effect in the reaction is the angular momentum restrictions imposed at the entrance and exit centrifugal barriers. A version of the algorithm is used which is adapted to the fact that the rotational motions at the exit barrier are one-dimensional in this system. The only parameter used in the calculation is the potential energy barrier, for which we find the best-fit value to be 5.9 × 10-20 J. © 1990.