Integral cross sections were measured for two reactions occurring in CH++O– collisions: the formation of the carbon monoxide cation CO+ via a reactive ionization process and the formation of the (iso)formyl cation HCO+ (HOC+) via the associative ionization process. Both carbon monoxide and formyl cations are present in the interstellar medium, the latter one being quite abundant in dense clouds. Provided the oxygen anion would also be present in the interstellar environment, the large efficiency of the two reactive processes reported here would justify their inclusion in astrochemical models. The whole set of data was obtained by means of a merged-beam setup operating with keV beams.
doi:10.1063/1.2187008
View online : J. Chem. Phys. 124, 154304 (2006)