Angular distributions for photodissociation of O2 in the Herzberg continuum

Photodissociation in the Herzberg continuum of molecular oxygen has been studied at 236, 226 and 204 nm. Using ion-imaging and monitoring of O(P-3(j)), j=0, 1, and 2 product-atom angular distributions, the amount of parallel character of the transition was measured. In order to interpret these data, analyses of the photoabsorption oscillator strengths and the parallel-perpendicular nature of the Herzberg I, II and III bands, and extrapolation of these properties into the Herzberg-continuum region have been performed. Our measured fine-structure-averaged angular distributions are found to be consistent with this photoabsorption model. In addition, the dynamics of the dissociation process is discussed, based on the O-atom fine-structure distributions. (C) 1998 American Institute of Physics.