Assessment of Excitation Mechanisms and Temporal Dependencies of Infrared Radiation from Vibrationally Excited Carbon Monoxide and Ozone in EXCEDE Experiments.
Abstract
A goal of the EXCEDE artificial aurora experiment is to quantify upper atmospheric infrared emission mechanisms for disturbed atmospheric conditions. In this report sources and vibrational excitation mechanisms relevant to electron bean induced infrared emission from carbon monoxide and ozone in the 90-130 km altitude range are reviewed and assessed. Estimates of vibrational excitation deposition fractions ratioed to the ion pair creation energy deposition level are presented along with predicted energy deposition and decay rates for each mechanism. Mechanisms considered for CO(v) production include direct electron impact on ambient CO, dissociative excitation of Carbon dioxide, V-V exchange with vibrationally excited Diatomic nitrogen, Diatomic oxygen, and Oxygen, and infrared chemiluminescence from the reaction of CO2 with O(+). The conclusions are that the initial production of CO(v) is dominated by direct electron impact on ambient CO which represents a fraction of .000045 of the ion pair production energy at 100 km altitude and decays with a radiative time constant of 28.3 ms. On a longer time scale of 0.1 to 100 s after electron beam termination, energy transfer from N2(A) and the O2(A',c) metastable states and from vibrationally excited N2(v) may contribute to CO(v) production. Potentially the strongest production mechanisms for vibrationally excited O3 are the two body reactions of O2(A, A',c) metastable states with ambient O2.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 31, 1987
- Accession Number
- ADA182930
Entities
People
- Charles E. Kolb
- Mark S. Zahniser
- Robert B. Lyons
Organizations
- Utah State University