A MODEL FOR RADIOLYSIS OF WATER

A model for the radiolysis of water at low LET is based on primordial, isolated single H2O+-e- pairs. It considers effects arising from hole and electron migration, reaction, and recombination prior to hydration. The high-frequency dielectric constant applies, and the early phenomena (which are generally ignored) should resemble their analogs in low-dielectric media, e.g., cyclohexane, which provide appropriate criteria. Dielectric relaxation follows charge trapping both inside and outside the escape distance (∼10 Å), only the latter giving observable eaq-. It is also assumed that e- prior to hydration is unreactive with Haq+. Effects usually attributed to spurs are assigned to geminate (H, H, OH, OH) arising from energetic recombination of non-hydrated (H3O+, OH, e-). These and other consequences of the model are compared with the recent literature on the radiolysis of aqueous systems.