Products of reaction Rb with C2H6 or CH4

Diode-pumped alkali vapor lasers (DPAL) commonly use CH
₄
or C
₂
H to induce energy transfer between n
²
P
_3/2
and n
²
P
_1/2
levels. A complication is that the alkali metal reacts with the hydrocarbons. High-level ab initio calculations have been used to study the reactive interactions between Rb and CH, or C
₂
H
₆
.