Atoms roam in search of a chemical mate

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Animation of carbon-carbon bond breaking

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Break dance: A carbon-carbon bond breaking, with one molecule crashing into the hydrogen atom of another molecule. Vision supplied by Joel Bowman, Emory University.

For almost a century, school text books have taught that chemical reactions involve atoms of the same or different elements rearranging themselves to form new substances. In doing so, the atoms are faced with two options: either they absorb heat or they give it off.

This seems straightforward enough and the route atoms take depends on which option requires the least energy. "In this sense, chemical reactions are not unlike human hikers, in that they prefer to take routes involving the least climbing," Scott Kable, the head of chemistry at the University of New South Wales, says.

The analogy in the chemistry world is that, in going from reactant to product, molecules hunt for what we call the 'transition state'.

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Atoms roam in search of a chemical mate