CORRELATED ELECTRONIC POTENTIAL-ENERGY SURFACES FOR PROTON INTERACTIONS WITH N-2

Highly correlated, quantum calculations have been carried out for the lower-lying electronic states of the (N-2-H)(+) system over a broad ra nge of relative distances and of internuclear coordinate values. The t wo main approaches of the impinging proton for the H+-N-2 entrance cha nnel are considered, i.e., the collinear and the perpendicular approac h. The present results on the strength and shape of dynamically import ant features like vibrational matrix elements and anisotropic coeffici ents indicate that the ground-state potential energy surface undergoes rather weak coupling with the excited electronic states that are resp onsible for charge-transfer (CT) processes, thus explaining why the ex periments found no presence of such final channels in the collisional process. Furthermore, the effect of bond distortion in the molecule ca used by the impinging proton is also seen to be rather small and to oc cur only for a limited range of orientations and of relative distances , in accordance with the weak excitation of the vibrational mode found by crossed beam experiments on the present system.