The FOTOAIR research group was founded at the beginning of the 1990’s, being at present a pioneer group in Spain in the assembly and use of experimental techniques of fast kinetics in the gas phase applied to the study of problems of interest in Atmospheric Chemistry. The group has extensive experience in the field of atmospheric photochemistry, especially in the experimental determination of rate coefficients of chemical processes using pulsed non-commercial laser photolysis techniques and atmospheric simulation chambers (or smog chambers). Moreover, in smog chamber experiments the reaction mechanisms and the quantification of the reaction/photolysis products are also investigated employing different analytical techniques. For air quality studies, several spectroscopic techniques for monitoring air pollutants in different locations in the Castilla-La Mancha region have been used.
Since 2010, a new research line started. It is devoted to the gas-phase kinetics of reactions of great interest in Astrophysics, particularly, in the Interstellar Medium (T=10-100 K). This new research line has a huge impact in the Astrophysical community and a pulsed CRESU (French acronym of Cinétique de Réaction en Ecoulement Supersonique Uniforme) system was built initially for accomplishing the objectives of the national CONSOLIDER-INGENIO2009 project (ASTROMOL) and latter of the ERC Synergy grant (NANOCOSMOS). Only a few research groups worldwide are engaged in the kinetic study at ultra-low temperatures due to the complexity of the experimental systems that are required.