With this grant from the Organic Dynamics Program, Professor Thomas H. Morton of the University of California, Riverside, will examine the gas phase chemistry of organic cations which react via ion-dipole complexes. The neutral products from the reactions of organic cations generated by 70eV electron impact will be examined by using an electron bombardment flow reactor. This reactor will provide stereochemical information about cation rearrangements which will be critical in order to understand ion molecule reactions. Gaseous cations generated by resonance enhanced multiphoton ionization will also be examined. Ionizations of specific conformations of molecules will be studied by slowing down conformational changes through rapid cooling by supersonic jet expansion. %%% The chemistry of gas phase molecules from which an electron has removed will be examined. The neutral products from these reactions will be isolated and identified. Several molecules which can exist in more than one rapidly interconverting geometry will also be examined. These molecules will be cooled to stop their interconversions and the chemistry of each geometric form of the molecule will be examined.
