Title: angular distribution
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - angular distribution
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.A00351
Status: current

Definition
With reference to the center of mass, the products of a bimolecular reaction are scattered with respect to the initial velocity vector, and the distribution of scattering angles is known as the angular distribution.

Related Terms
- bimolecular: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/M03989
- products: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/P04861
- scattering: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/S05487

Source
- PAC, 1996, 68, 149. 'A glossary of terms used in chemical kinetics, including reaction dynamics (IUPAC Recommendations 1996)' on page 153 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac199668010149)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/A00351/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/A00351/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/A00351/xml

Citation: Citation: 'angular distribution' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.A00351
License: The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms.
Collection: If you are interested in licensing the Gold Book for commercial use, please contact the IUPAC Executive Director at executivedirector@iupac.org .
Disclaimer: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using.
Accessed: 2026-07-11T19:20:24+00:00