Road tunnels safety according to European legislation

The article deals with safety of European road tunnels in accordance with actual European legislation. Standards and recommendations of European Commission, PIARC and other professional bodies of the European Union define minimal technological requirements for equipment and operation of the tunnels in scope of Trans-European Road Network

Excited states of Pt(PF₃)₄ andb their role in focused electron beam nanofabrication

Electron induced chemistry of metal-containing precursor molecules is central in focused electron beam induced deposition (FEBID). While some elementary processes leading to precursor decomposition were quantitatively characterized, data for neutral dissociation is missing. We provide this data for the model precursor Pt(PF3)4 by using the available cross sections for electronic excitation and characterizing fragmentation of the excited states theoretically by TDDFT. The potential energy curves for a number of states visible in the experimental electron energy loss spectra are dissociative, either directly or via conical intersections, indicating that the quantum yield for dissociation is close to 100%. Taking into account typical electron energy distribution at the FEBID spot reveals that the importance of neutral dissociation exceeds that of dissociative electron attachment, which has been so far considered to be the dominant decomposition process. We thus established neutral dissociation as an important, albeit often neglected, channel for FEBID using Pt(PF3)4. The calculations revealed a number of other phenomena that can play a role in electron induced chemistry of this compound, e.g., a considerable increase of bond dissociation energy with sequential removal of multiple ligands

Long-lived transient anion of c-C₄F₈O

We report partial cross sections for electron attachment to c-C4F8O, a gas with promising technological applications in free-electron-rich environments. The dissociative electron attachment leads to a number of anionic fragments resulting from complex bond-breaking and bond-forming processes. However, the anion with the highest abundance is the non-dissociated (transient) parent anion which is formed around 0.9 eV electron energy. Its lifetime reaches tens of microseconds. We discuss the origin of this long lifetime, the anion’s strong interactions with other molecules, and the consequences for electron-scavenging properties of c-C4F8O in denser environments, in particular for its use in mixtures with CO2 and N

Partial cross sections for dissociative electron attachment to tetrahydrofuran reveal a dynamics-driven rich fragmentation pattern

We report partial absolute cross sections for dissociative electron attachment (DEA) to tetrahydrofuran C₄H₈O. The high sensitivity of the present setup, quantitative DEA spectrometer with time-of-flight analyzer, led to identification of a number of previously unreported fragments (CH₂⁻, OH⁻, CHO⁻, C₄H₅O⁻, C₃H₃⁻) thus revealing complex dissociation dynamics of the involved resonant states. The chemical composition of fragment anions was assigned by experiments with completely deuterated tetrahydrofuran. We also show that the dominant heavy anionic fragment with m/z = 41 is C₃H₅⁻ anion rather than C₂HO⁻ as reported in the previous studies, in spite of the fact that formation of the latter one is energetically more favorable. The dynamics on the resonant state is thus more decisive for the reaction outcome than the asymptotic energetics. The assignment of resonances and their dynamic pathways is discussed by using comparison with recent complementary experiments that characterize electronic states of neutral and ionic tetrahydrofuran

Role of the molecular environment in quenching the irradiation-driven fragmentation of Fe(CO)5_5: a reactive molecular dynamics study

Irradiation-driven fragmentation and chemical transformations of molecular systems play a key role in nanofabrication processes where organometallic compounds break up due to the irradiation with focused particle beams. In this study, reactive molecular dynamics simulations have been performed to analyze the role of the molecular environment on the irradiation-induced fragmentation of molecular systems. As a case study, we consider the dissociative ionization of iron pentacarbonyl, Fe(CO)$_5$, a widely used precursor molecule for focused electron beam-induced deposition. In connection to recent experiments, the irradiation-induced fragmentation dynamics of an isolated Fe(CO)$_5^+$ molecule is studied and compared with that of a Fe(CO)$_5^+$ molecule embedded into an argon cluster. The appearance energies of different fragments of an isolated Fe(CO)$_5^+$ agree with the recent experimental data. For Fe(CO)$_5^+$ embedded into an argon cluster, the simulations reproduce the experimentally observed suppression of Fe(CO)$_5^+$ fragmentation and provide an atomistic-level understanding of this effect. Understanding irradiation-driven fragmentation patterns for molecular systems in environments facilitates the advancement of atomistic models of irradiation-induced chemistry processes involving complex molecular systems.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure

Electron attachment properties of c-C₄F₈O in different environments

The electron attachment properties of octafluorotetrahydrofuran (c-C₄F₈O) are investigated using two complementary experimental setups. The attachment and ionization cross sections of c-C₄F₈O are measured using an electron beam experiment. The effective ionization rate coefficient, electron drift velocity and electron diffusion coefficient in c-C₄F₈O diluted to concentrations lower than 0.6% in the buffer gases N₂, CO₂ and Ar, are measured using a pulsed Townsend experiment. A kinetic model is proposed, which combines the results of the two experiments

Supplementary information for: "Dissociative electron attachment and electronic excitation in Fe(CO)(5)"

Geometry of Fe(CO)5 (xyz coordinates); Excited states: Spin and dipole allowed transitions; Spin allowed, dipole forbidden transitions; Singlet-triplet transitions.The supplementary information for: Allan, M., Lacko, M., Papp, P., Matejcik, S., Zlatar, M., Fabrikant, I. I., Kocisek, J.,& Fedor, J. (2018). Dissociative electron attachment and electronic excitation in Fe(CO)(5). Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics, Royal Soc Chemistry, Cambridge., 20(17), 11692-11701. [https://doi.org/10.1039/c8cp01387j]The published version of the article: [https://cer.ihtm.bg.ac.rs/handle/123456789/2312]The peer-reviewed version of the article: [http://cer.ihtm.bg.ac.rs/handle/123456789/2659

Resonances in nitrobenzene probed by the electron attachment to neutral and by the photodetachment from anion

We probe resonances (transient anions) in nitrobenzene with the focus on the electron emission from these. Experimentally, we populate resonances in two ways: either by the impact of free electrons on the neutral molecule or by the photoexcitation of the bound molecular anion. These two excitation means lead to transient anions in different initial geometries. In both cases, the anions decay by electron emission and we record the electron spectra. Several types of emission are recognized, differing by the way in which the resulting molecule is vibrationally excited. In the excitation of specific vibrational modes, distinctly different modes are visible in electron collision and photodetachment experiments. The unspecific vibrational excitation, which leads to the emission of thermal electrons following the internal vibrational redistribution, shows similar features in both experiments. A model for the thermal emission based on a detailed balance principle agrees with the experimental findings very well. Finally, a similar behavior in the two experiments is also observed for a third type of electron emission, the vibrational autodetachment, which yields electrons with constant final energies over a broad range of excitation energies. The entrance channels for the vibrational autodetachment are examined in detail, and they point to a new mechanism involving a reverse valence to non-valence internal conversion