Mechanism of the radiolysis of water

The authors discuss the modern concepts of the radiolysis of water and a variant of the mechanism of radiolysis that most satisfactorily describes the experimental functions not only in dulute but also in concentrated aqueous solutions. The authors use analytical expressions for the yields of the molecular products of the radiolysis of water in the region of low concentrations of substances dissolved in it. A table compares the effects of various inhibitors of the release of molecular hydrogen with their reactivity relative to the H atom, the hydrated and presolvated electrons. The recombination-diffusion model of the radiolysis of water is presented. The model under consideration describes and satisfactorily explains the main experimental data on the radiolysis of water in the picosecond region.