Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

Much of chemistry everywhere involves metal atoms. This research proposal explores the role of metal atoms in their positive singly and multiply-charged ionic state (with one or more) electrons removed in a variety of chemical and biological environments. Measurements will be taken with state-of-the-art instrumentation to characterize and understand the chemical reactivity of isolated atomic metal and non-metal ions with small molecules including many atmospheric gases. The results of these measurements will find application in analytical mass spectrometry as aplied in elemental analysis and geochronology, for example. Other measurements will explore the change in reactivity when singly and doubly-charged atomic metal ions are attached to organic or biological fragments such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and buckyballs. Metal cations will also be attached to multiply-charged DNA-like anions. Special emphasis will be given to the chemical and ultraviolet cleavage of these DNA-like anions, as well as the chemical repair of such ions, and this will be done in the absence and presence of metal atom ions. The role of metal cations as catalysts will be explored using both experiment and theory in the oxidation of hydrocarbons in the gas phase nd this may find application in catalytic converters as well as advancing our understanding of the fundamentals of catalysis. Metal impurities will be measured in new organic semiconductor molecules in an attempt to ascertain their importance in the performance of these semiconductors. We shall also look outward to the role of atomic metal cations in the chemistry of planetary atmospheres including our own where metals are deposited by meteor ablation and still further out in interstellar clouds where metal cations are thought to exist both as free atomic ions and bound to small organic molecules or particles. Of particular interest in these latter environments is the metal-catalyzed growth of biological molecules such as amino acids and peptides. Very little is known about the importance of metals in the chemistry of space.