1 research outputs found
Failure of hydrogenation in protecting polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons from fragmentation
A recent study of soft X-ray absorption in native and hydrogenated coronene
cations, CH , led to the conclusion that additional
hydrogen atoms protect (interstellar) Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon (PAH)
molecules from fragmentation [Reitsma et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 053002
(2014)]. The present experiment with collisions between fast (30-200 eV) He
atoms and pyrene (CH, , 6, and 16) and simulations
without reference to the excitation method suggests the opposite. We find that
the absolute carbon-backbone fragmentation cross section does not decrease but
increases with the degree of hydrogenation for pyrene molecules.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure