Reactive collisions of very low-energy electrons with H₂⁺: rotational transitions and dissociative recombination

A new series of computations has been performed to obtain cross-sections and rate coefficients for state-to-state rotational transitions in the H|₂⁺| ion, induced by collisions with very low-energy electrons. Following our recent work on the HD+ ion (Motapon et al. 2014), and using the same molecular structure data sets, excitations |Nᵢ⁺ →||Nᵢ⁺+2| for |Nᵢ⁺=0| to 10, and de-excitations |Nᵢ⁺| → |Nᵢ⁺-2|⁠, for |Nᵢ⁺=2| to 10, in the energy range 0.01 meV–0.3 eV, have been explored. The calculated cross-sections have been convolved in order to obtain Maxwell rate coefficients for electronic temperatures up to a few hundred of Kelvin. Moreover, Maxwell rate coefficients for dissociative recombination have been calculated for the same initial rotational levels.