Author(s)

Paul Chadwick, Jack Treacy and Howard Sidebottom

Abstract

Kinetic Studies on the Reaction of OH Radicals with Aromatic Compounds A contribution to subproject CMD Paul Chadwick*, Jack Treacy* and Howard Sidebottom^ * School of Chemistry, Dublin Institute of Technology, Dublin #, Ireland ^Department of Chemistry, University College Dublin, Ireland Introduction Aromatic compounds when released into the atmosphere can have a direct effect on health as well as contributing to the formation of secondary air pollutants including ozone. The major loss process for aromatics in the troposphere is by reaction with the OH radical and the rate constants with several aromatics have been established (Atkinson, 1989). The degradation of aromatics by the OH radical proceeds via two pathways: addition to the benzene ring or abstraction of a H atom from an alkyl side chain. All investigations have shown that the ratio of addition over abstraction is temperature dependant and at ro

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