Nature has an interface between gasses and liquids. It is important to a lot of industrial processes. Researchers have developed an apparatus to study reactions between gas and liquids with new levels of detail. A flat liquid surface is used as the target of the beam. The data collected by the detector is based on the speed, direction, and mass of the beam. Researchers can deduce changes related to gas and liquid interactions. The researchers looked at the interaction between noble gas neon and liquid dodecane.
A unique chemical environment exists between the gas and liquid phases. Understanding how carbon moves between the air and the sea is important. This interface affects how air and fuel mix is used in internal combustion engines. New opportunities for gasliquid interface studies of volatile liquids have been opened by the flat jet scattering apparatus. The liquid water surface has a resolution that can be studied by scientists. This method will be used by the researchers to study the formation of acid rain.
The first results of a new flat jet scattering apparatus have been reported. The feasibility of the apparatus was demonstrated by studying the neon liquid dodecane scattering system. They started by measuring the amount of carbon dioxide in the air. The outgoing neon molecule has a MaxwellBoltzmann distribution. Unperturbed evaporation of neon is indicated by this. Neon atoms were used to investigate the scattering dynamics.
The team was able to observe two main mechanisms in the scattering experiments. Molecules that are impinging on the surface thermalize with the liquid and then desorb. The mechanism has a similarity to the one from the studies. Information about the initial beam energy and direction is not always the same. This condition was used to quantify the transfer of energy from neon to the liquid. The energy transfer can be modeled with a soft sphere model. The model allowed them to estimate the effective surface mass of dodecane to be 60 amu, which is much smaller than a single dodecane molecule. Experiments related to protic/aprotic scattering off dodecane and reactive scattering from water will be conducted by the team.
More information: Chin Lee et al, Evaporation and Molecular Beam Scattering from a Flat Liquid Jet, The Journal of Physical Chemistry A (2022). DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpca.2c01174
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