Comparison between Molecular Structure Effects in Triplet Positronium Annihilation Rates and Radiolysis Free Ion Yields in Liquid Hydrocarbons

Abstract

Two seemingly unrelated phenomena in liquid hydrocarbons have similar trends in their dependences upon the molecular structure of the hydrocarbon. The phenomena are the annihilation half-life of triplet positronium and the radiolysis free ion yield. In n-alkanes the effect of increasing the molecular chain length, upon both phenomena, appears to be simply to increase the density of interacting sites. Branching the alkane chain decreases the strength of molecular interaction with both electrons and positronium, although the relative decrease is much greater for the former than for the latter. The effects of double bonds on the phenomena, after separating out the density effect, are different from each other.