Reactions and thermochemistry of small transition metal cluster ions

This review discusses the reactivities and thermodynamics of small-size-spe cific transition metal clusters and focuses on thermodynamic information, w hich has not been comprehensively discussed before. Because of this focus, guided-ion-beam mass spectrometry was used to acquire much of the data. The details of this technique and the associated data analysis methods are pro vided. Results on the stabilities of bare transition metal clusters are pro vided for neutral, cationic, and anionic species. Implications for the elec tronic and geometrical structures are discussed, as well as the extrapolati on of these values to bulk phase behavior. Detailed results for reactions o f transition metal clusters with D-2 and the oxygen donors O-2 and CO2 are reviewed. Available bond energies between size-specific clusters and one D atom and one and two O atoms are compiled, and their implications are evalu ated and favorably compared with bulk phase analogs. Several additional the rmodynamic studies of various cluster systems are also discussed.