A study of the unimolecular decompositions of the (C3H6)+2 and (c-C3H6)+2 complexes

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Abstract
The major product channels identified in the unimolecular decompositions of C3H+6⋅C3H6 and c-C3H+6⋅c-C3H6 in the total energy [neutral (C3H6)2 or (c-C3H6)2 heat of formation plus excitation energy] range of ∼230–450 kcal/mol are C3H+7+C3H5, C4H+7+C2H5, C4H+8+C2H4, and C5H+9+CH3. The measured appearance energy for C4H+7(9.54±0.04 eV) from (C3H6)2 is equal to the thermochemical threshold for the formation of C4H+7+C2H5 from (C3H6)2, indicating that the exit potential energy barrier for the ion–molecule reaction C3H+6+C3H6→C4H+7+C2H5 is negligible. There is evidence that the formations of C4H+7+C2H4+H from (C3H6)+2 and (c-C3H6)+2 also proceed with high probabilities when they are energetically allowed. The variations of the relative abundances for C4H+7,C4H+8, and C5H+9 from (C3H6)+2 and (c-C3H6)+2 as a function of ionizing photon energy are in qualitative agreement, suggesting that (C3H6)+2 and (c-C3H6)+2 rearrange to similar C6H+12 isomers prior to fragmentation. The fact that C6H+11 is found to be a primary ion from the unimolecular decomposition of (c-C3H6)+2 but not (C3H6)+2 supports the conclusion that the distribution of C6H+12 collision complexes involved in the C3H+6+C3H6 reactions is different from that in the cyclopropane ion–molecule reactions. Using the ionization energies (IE) of (C3H6)2(9.33±0.04 eV) and (c-C3H6)2(9.61±0.04 eV) determined in this study, the calculation of the bond dissociation energies for C3H+6⋅C3H6 and c-C3H+6⋅c-C3H6 gives 0.43 and 0.14 eV, respectively. The measured IE of C3H6 is 9.738±0.003 eV and that of c-C3H6 is 9.721±0.011 eV.

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