Date Published:

DEC 1

Abstract:

Air is shown to burn (in theory, using two complementary procedures) under the unusual combination of conditions made possible within a cluster heated by a supersonic impact at an inert surface. Both clusters of neat N-2/O-2 and clusters containing several N-2 and O-2 molecules within a rare gas envelope have been studied. The principal reaction is N-2+ O-2 –> 2NO which proceeds via a four-center mechanism. The four-center reaction N-2 + O-2 –> N2O + O leads to N2O which is quite hot, as is to be expected on the basis of kinematic considerations, and is efficiently destroyed as the cluster expands. During the early, compression, stage multi- (>4) center reactions readily occur. The results of molecular dynamics simulations using a many-body potential are well accounted for by a distribution of products of maximum entropy subject to conservation of energy, matter and charge.