Taiwan team contributes to atmospheric research

2015-01-08

A youth team from Taiwan has shed new light on ozone research by providing important information about atmospheric chemistry, according to Academia Sinica Jan. 6.

Led by Chao Wen, a chemistry major at National Taiwan University, the team comprises Hsieh Jun-ting, a sophomore at Stanford University, Chang Chun-hung, a research assistant at AS Institute of Atomic and Molecular Sciences and Lin Jr-min, a research fellow at the AS institute.

The paper Direct Kinetic Measurement of the Reaction of the Simplest Criegee Intermediate with Water Vapor was accepted by the prestigious journal Science and featured Jan. 1 on the publication’s website Science Express.

According to team advisor Lin, carbonyl oxides, also known as Criegee intermediates, are formed in the atmosphere by the reactions of unsaturated hydrocarbons with ozone.

“The study of reactions involving CIs is crucial to atmospheric research and understanding the formation of aerosols and acid rain,” Lin said. “Although direct detection of CIs has been materialized recently, little is known about the transient species given their short lifetime.”

A number of groups around the world have been studying the physical and chemical properties of CIs in recent years, Lin said. But limited by their experimental methods, they could only do so under low pressure conditions widely differing from the atmosphere.

Lin said the team successfully overcame the pressure gap by using ultraviolet absorption spectroscopy to investigate the lifetime of CH2OO, the simplest CIs, under various humidity levels at near atmospheric pressures.

“In addition, our team members are young, so their research potential is unlimited,” he said, adding that Chao and Hsieh joined his lab because they had attended a high school science camp organized by Lin four years ago.

As the youngest individual from Taiwan to have a research paper accepted by Science, Chao chalked the achievement up to teamwork and Lin’s mentoring.

“But I don’t feel particularly excited about it,” Chao said, adding that he plans to pursue graduate study and looks forward to continuing on in Lin’s lab.

Source: Taiwan Today (http://taiwantoday.tw/ct.asp?xItem=225965&CtNode=413)