On the production of N₂O from the reaction of O(¹D) with N₂

Ozone was photolyzed at 2537 A and at 25°C in the presence of 42–115 torrs of O2 and about 880 torrs of N2 to test the relative importance of the two reactions O(¹D) + N2 + M → N2O + M and O(¹D) + N2 → O(³P) + N2. In this study N2O was not found as a product. Thus from our detectability limit for N2O (0.3 μ) an upper limit to the efficiency of the first reaction relative to the second of 2.5 × 10−6 at 1000-torr total pressure was computed. This value corresponds to k1/k2 < 0.8 × 10−25 cm³/particle.