THE 

 LONDON, EDINBURGH and DUBLIN 



PHILOSOPHICAL MAGAZINE I 



AND 



JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 



[SIXTH SERIES.] 



JUNE 1914 



01. The Disintegration of anion Cluster irtrrt ' • Gas ^ttnder 

 the Influence of an Electric Field. By R. D. Kleeman, 

 D.Sc, B.A.* ' 



WE should expect that the ion clusters in a gas would 

 gradually break up into free ions through being 

 bombarded by neutral molecules, and the free ions gradually 

 become clusters, reasoning from the parallel case of chemical 

 association and dissociation in a gas. The equilibrium 

 between the free ions and clusters would be regulated by the 

 law of mass action and the laws of thermodynamics. It was 

 theoretically investigated, and its bearing on the velocity of 

 ions, &c, in a previous paper by the writer |. It becomes of 

 interest next to investigate experimentally whether the time 

 of process of disintegration of an ion cluster is affected when 

 it is brought under the influence of an electric field. The 

 process of disintegration may be affected by the field in two 

 ways, viz., (a) through increasing the violence of collision of 

 the ion cluster with the neutral molecules, (b) in completing 

 the separation of the elementary ion from its cluster of 

 neutral molecules, which have become separated on collision 

 but which would combine again in the absence of an electric 

 field. In order to fix our ideas let us consider what may 

 happen to an ion cluster in electric fields of different in- 

 tensities. Suppose, firstly, that the field applied is so weak 

 that the process of d sintegration of the cluster remains 



* Communicated by the Author. 



t Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc. vol. xvi. pt. iv. p. 285. 



Phil, Mag. S. 6. Vol. 27. No. 162. June 1914. 3 P 



