Reactant Vibrational Excitations Are More Effective than Translational Energy in Promoting an Early-Barrier Reaction F + H₂O → HF + OH

The exothermic F + H₂O → HF + OH reaction has a decidedly “early” or “reactant-like” barrier. According to a naïve interpretation of the Polanyi’s rules, translational energy would be more effective than vibrational energy in promoting such reactions. However, we demonstrate here using both quasi-classical trajectory and full-dimensional quantum wave packet methods on an accurate global potential energy surface that excitations in the H₂O vibrational degrees of freedom have higher efficacy in enhancing the reactivity of the title reaction than the same amount of translational energy, thus providing a counter-example to Polanyi’s rules. This enhancement of reactivity is analyzed using a vibrational adiabatic model, which sheds light on the surprising mode selectivity in this reaction.