A Balance of Unimolecular and Bimolecular Pathways Control the Temperature-Dependent Kinetics of Ozonolysis in Aerosols

04 October 2024, Version 1
This content is a preprint and has not undergone peer review at the time of posting.

Abstract

To better understand the key kinetic mechanisms controlling heterogeneous oxidation in organic aerosols, submicron particles composed of an alkene and a saturated carboxylic acid are exposed to ozone in a variable-temperature flow tube reactor. Effective uptake coefficients (γ_eff) are obtained from the multiphase reaction kinetics, which are quantified by Vacuum Ultraviolet Photoionization Aerosol Mass Spectrometry. For aerosols composed of only of alkenes, γ_eff doubles (from 6x10-4 to 1.2x10-3) when the temperature is decreased from 293 to 263 K. Alternatively, for an alkene particle doped with a carboxylic acid, an efficient scavenger of stabilized Criegee Intermediates (sCI), γ_eff is observed to be weakly temperature dependent. A kinetic model, benchmarked to literature data, explains these results as arising from the temperature dependent competition between unimolecular pathways of sCI that promote radical chain cycling and those bimolecular pathways that form stable chain termination products (i.e., ɑ-acyloxyalkyl hydroperoxides). The implication of these results for the kinetics of aerosol aging at low temperatures is discussed.

Keywords

Organic Aerosols
Multiphase Chemistry
Heterogeneous Oxidation
Ozonolysis
Criegee Intermediates

Supplementary materials

Title
Description
Actions
Title
Supporting information
Description
Schematics of the experimental setup and instrumentation (Figures S1–S2), table of reaction rate constants (Table S1) and discussion of parameters used in reaction-diffusion simulations, sensitivity tests of parameters (Figures S3–S4), kinetics of additional peaks identified in main text (Figures S5–S9), proposed ion fragmentation mechanisms (Schemes S1–S3), evaluations of Arrhenius parameters for kAAHP (Table S2, Figures S10–S11), and predicted kinetics of [sCI] (Figure S12).
Actions

Comments

Comments are not moderated before they are posted, but they can be removed by the site moderators if they are found to be in contravention of our Commenting Policy [opens in a new tab] - please read this policy before you post. Comments should be used for scholarly discussion of the content in question. You can find more information about how to use the commenting feature here [opens in a new tab] .
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy [opens in a new tab] and Terms of Service [opens in a new tab] apply.