Knowledge Bank

The light produced by a pulsed Hel laser$\mathrm{<mrow\; data-mjx-texclass="ORD">1</mrow>}$ has been used to excite the molecular vibration of HCl. The vibrational energy transfer rates in $HCl-CO2$, HCl-HI and other gaseous mixtures were measured. Since the vibrational energy is transferred rapidly from HCl to $CO2$, laser action of $CO2$ is obtained by mixing $CO2$ into the pulsed HCl laser system. By using $CO2$ laser quanta as an indicator, we have effectively titrated the number of HCl vibrational quanta produced in the chemical reaction $Cl\cdot +HI\to HCl+I\cdot$.