Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Looking for interesting/useful reaction that uses UV light as catalyst or energy source

RogueRose - 10-8-2020 at 15:17

I'd like any suggestions for reactions that use UV light to make useful chemicals, I'm having a hard time searching for this as I keep getting flooded with covid results in my UV light searched - you would think it was the only thing UV light was used for..

I'm planning on building a generation setup that uses carbon rod plasma arc submerged in water and that produces a lot of UV light, though I'm not sure which wave lenght(s) are most abundant (A/B/C) and I was thinking that it would be interesting and useful to maybe do a side reaction to utilize the UV light production, but I really know nothing about any common reactions that require UV light as the catalyst or energy source.

I was planning on running the plasma arc in a 2 or 3 neck flask and thought that a jacketed flask would allow for very good absorption of the light by running the side reaction through the jacket, and possibly wrapping the entire flask in something reflective like mylar or aluminum foil.

The only thing I'm a little worried about is the temp of the inner water-gas reaction chamber and if it will need to be cooled vs the needed temp of the UV reaction in the jacket. I can setup a cooling system to maintain a temp for the jacket reaction (and I guess the inside chamber if necessary) but I guess this will depend on what types of reactions are possible.

Does anyone know of any reactions that would produce something useful in this setup?

Bedlasky - 10-8-2020 at 18:07

Hi.

Look at these:

https://colourchem.wordpress.com/2019/06/25/photochemical-ox...

https://www.dwc.knaw.nl/DL/publications/PU00014693.pdf

RogueRose - 10-8-2020 at 18:52

Quote: Originally posted by Bedlasky  
Hi.

Look at these:

https://colourchem.wordpress.com/2019/06/25/photochemical-ox...

https://www.dwc.knaw.nl/DL/publications/PU00014693.pdf


Thanks. So photochemical reactions is basically the term I'm looking for with this process? If it's not, or if there are any additional terms for it I could use, it would make searching much easier than dealing with searches containint "UV light reactions" (even using the "-covid" expression), much easier.

macckone - 10-8-2020 at 20:24

Any number of chlorination reactions are UV activated.
The most obvious is chlorination of methane.
Chlorination of hydrogen is another (although it can also be spark activated).
I am certain there are others.

Bedlasky - 11-8-2020 at 11:17

Quote: Originally posted by RogueRose  


Thanks. So photochemical reactions is basically the term I'm looking for with this process? If it's not, or if there are any additional terms for it I could use, it would make searching much easier than dealing with searches containint "UV light reactions" (even using the "-covid" expression), much easier.


Photochemical reaction is reaction which proceeds because of action of some electromagnetic radiation (not just only UV radiation, but also IR, visible, microwave, roentgen radiation etc...). So something like UV photochemicals reactions should be perfect.

wg48temp9 - 11-8-2020 at 13:46

You will probably enjoy read the following paper about Light-Controlled Radical Polymerization. Unfortunately such reactions tend to use exotic compounds.

Oops the file will not load, try a link to it https://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1021/acs.chemrev.5b00671

Sigmatropic - 11-8-2020 at 13:59

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