Emission from OH(A) produced in the dissociative recombination of H2O+ with electrons

The production of OH(A) from the dissociative recombination of H2O+ with electrons has been studied in a crossed jet experiment. The branching ratio into the OH(A)+H product channel has been estimated to be 7.6%+8%/−4% for an electron temperature of ∼1000 K. The internal energy of the OH(A) has been determined from modeling the emission spectrum. The vibrational distribution is 1.00:0.87 for v=0:v=1. The estimated error is ±15% for both states. The rotational temperatures were found to be 4000 K for both v=0 and 1. The estimated error is +500, −1000 K. The present work represents one of the first measurements of the internal energy distribution of the molecular products of the dissociative recombination of a molecular cation and an electron.