Controlling chemical reactions near absolute zeroIt is an understatement to say that chemical reacti
Controlling chemical reactions near absolute zero
It is an understatement to say that chemical reactions take place everywhere, constantly. In both nature and the lab, chemistry is ubiquitous. But despite advances, it remains a fundamental challenge to gain a complete understanding and control over all aspects of a chemical reaction, such as temperature and the orientation of reacting molecules and atoms.
This requires sophisticated experiments where all the variables that define how two reactants approach, and ultimately react with, each other can be freely chosen. By controlling things like the speed and the orientation of the reactants, chemists can study the finest details of a particular reaction mechanism.
In a new study, a team led by Andreas Osterwalder at EPFL’s Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering, working with theorists from the University of Toronto, have built an apparatus that allows them to control the orientation and energies of reacting atoms, down to nearly absolute zero. “It’s the coldest formation of a chemical bond ever observed in molecular beams,” says Osterwalder. A molecular beam is a jet of gas inside a vacuum chamber, frequently used in spectroscopy and studies in fundamental chemistry.
