Perez-Rios Research Selected for the 2022 JCP Emerging Investigators Special Collection

The Journal of Chemical Physics (JCP) Emerging Investigators Special Collection is a special issue dedicated to young investigators in the field of chemical physics, and very few works are accepted as part of this annual special issue.

A depiction of the interactions between three bodies (left), and their corresponding representation in a coordinate system that makes the problem more tractable. [Source].

The selected study focuses on three-body interactions, and in particular seeks to characterize the behavior of interactions of two neutral atoms and a charged atom.

These types of processes, summarized by the reactions

A + A + B⁺ → A₂ + B⁺
A + A + B⁺ → A + AB⁺

are critically important in a variety of different disciplines, from chemical physics to astrophysics.

The research depends on a mapping of the problem in regular coordinates to hyperspherical coordinates. Working with specific coordinates allows one to transfer the 3-body collisions in 3D space (a problem with 18 variables - each particle's x, y, andz coordinates as well as its momentum in these three directions) to a space with only 6 variables.

The published article may be found here. To read more about the Emerging Investigators Special Collection, read here.

Read more here.