Electronic-to-vibrational, -rotational, and -translational energy transfer: S(¹D)+CO, N₂, O₂, and CO₂ measured by Doppler spectroscopy

Collisions of S(¹D) with CO, N₂, O₂, and CO₂ have been investigated to estimate the fraction of the sulfur electronic energy that is deposited in the internal degrees of freedom in the collision partner during the quenching of S(¹D) to S(³P). The experiment measures the Doppler profile of the S(³P) product, a profile that depends both on the amount of energy disposed into the internal degrees of freedom and on the differential scattering cross section for the inelastic collision. For CO and N₂ the results are consistent with a collision complex model for which the scattering is assumed to be isotropic in the collision plane and for which the energy is partitioned statistically into the degrees of freedom. Under the assumption of isotropic scattering, the results suggest that less energy than the statistical prediction is partitioned into translation for collisions with O₂, whereas more energy is partitioned into translation for CO₂.