Probing isotope effects in chemical reactions using single ions

Abstract

Isotope effects in reactions between Mg+ in the 3p 2P3/2 excited state and molecular hydrogen at thermal energies are studied through single reaction events. From only ~250 reactions with HD, the branching ratio between formation of MgD+ and MgH+ is found to be larger than 5. From additional 65 reactions with H2 and D2 we find that the overall decay probability of the intermediate MgH2+, MgHD+ or MgD2+ complexes is the same. Our study shows that few single ion reactions can provide quantitative information on ion-neutral reactions. Hence, the method is well-suited for reaction studies involving rare species, e.g., rare isotopes or short-lived unstable elements.

4 pages, 4 figures. Submitted for publication

References in corpus (5)

• Non-Destructive Identification of Cold and Extremely Localized Single Molecular Ions
• Photodetachment of cold OH- in a multipole ion trap
• Blackbody-radiation-assisted molecular laser cooling
• Isotope shifts of the 4s2 1S0 -> 4s5p 1P1 transition and hyperfine splitting of the 4s5p 1P1 state in calcium
• Rotational cooling of heteronuclear molecular ions with ^1-Sigma, ^2-Sigma, ^3-Sigma and ^2-Pi electronic ground states

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