Heavy N+ ion transfer in doubly charged N2Ar van der Waals cluster

• Published in: Nature communications 2020-06, Vol.11 (1), p.2987-2987, Article 2987
• Main Authors: Zhu, XiaoLong, Hu, XiaoQing, Yan, ShunCheng, Peng, YiGeng, Feng, WenTian, Guo, DaLong, Gao, Yong, Zhang, ShaoFeng, Cassimi, Amine, Xu, JiaWei, Zhao, DongMei, Dong, DaPu, Hai, Bang, Wu, Yong, Wang, JianGuo, Ma, X.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 140/58; 639/638/440/948; 639/638/440/950; 639/766/36/1120; Applied physics; Charge transfer; Chemical bonds; Clusters; Computational mathematics; Energy; Energy charge; Fragmentation; Heavy ions; Humanities and Social Sciences; Ion pairs; Molecular ions; multidisciplinary; Mutation; Open channels; Science; Science (multidisciplinary)
• ISSN: 2041-1723; 2041-1723
• DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-16749-w

Van der Waals clusters are weakly bound atomic/molecular systems and are an important medium for understanding micro-environmental chemical phenomena in bio-systems. The presence of neighboring atoms may open channels otherwise forbidden in isolated atoms/molecules. In hydrogen-bond clusters, proton transfer plays a crucial role, which involves mass and charge migration over large distances within the cluster and results in its fragmentation. Here we report an exotic transfer channel involving a heavy N + ion observed in a doubly charged cluster produced by 1 MeV Ne 8+ ions: (N 2 Ar) 2+ →N + +NAr + . The neighboring Ar atom decreases the N 2 2 + barrier height and width, resulting in significant shorter lifetimes of the metastable molecular ion state N 2 2 + ( X 1 Σ g + ). Consequently, the breakup of the covalent N + −N + bond, the tunneling out of the N + ion from the N 2 2 + potential well, as well as the formation of an N−Ar + bound system take place almost simultaneously, resulting in a Coulomb explosion of N + and NAr + ion pairs. There are multiple ways by which energy and charge transfer occur in weakly bound systems. Here the authors reveal a heavy ion N + transfer in a doubly charged Van der Waals cluster produced in collisions of the highly charged Ne 8+ ion with N 2 Ar, leading to fragmentation of N + and NAr + via Coulomb explosion.