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Environmental Chemistry

SUNY - Environmental Science and Forestry

NEWS! Cover Article in Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics
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Research Summary

The Dibble group investigates gas phase chemistry of organic radicals, focusing on atmospheric chemistry. We have long been involved in studying the reaction pathways of alkoxy radicals (RO) in the lower atmosphere, in the context of formation of photochemical smog and the global oxidizing capacity of the atmosphere. Another interest has been the atmospheric chemistry of isoprene. We have begun investigating the use of electron beams and plasmas to degrade airborne pollutants. A new project involves the unimolecular reactions of peroxy radicals that initiate combustion of biodiesel fuels.

Experimental studies employ lasers to probe for stable and transient species. Both reaction kinetics and the spectroscopy of new species have been studied using laser-induced fluorescence (LIF). Cavity ringdown spectroscopy in the near infrared is also used. We carry out ab initio and density functional calculations to map out thermochemical kinetics and to explore and interpret the spectroscopy of as-yet uncharacterized species. See the article about our computational work in Access, the magazine of the National Compuational Science Alliance.

Department of Chemistry
SUNY-ESF
1 Forestry Drive
Syracuse, NY 13210
(315) 470-6596 (Dr. Dibble)
(315) 470-4780 (Lab)
(315) 470-6856 (fax)
tsdibble[at]esf.edu Dr. Dibble's Official Web Page