Photodissociation of HCO radical via Ã2 A″ state: Accurate determination of bond dissociation energy D0(H–CO)

The photodissociation dynamics of jet-cooled HCO radical was investigated in the region of 490 nm to 715 nm using the H-atom high-n Rydberg time-of-flight (HRTOF) technique. The CO product rovibrational state populations are well resolved in the H + CO product translational energy distributions, and an accurate H–C bond dissociation energy D0(H–CO) = 5086 ± 5 cm−1 is obtained.