Why can't you prepare ozone manually by combining oxygen and nascent oxygen?

Answer 1

Oxygen hangs around as the diatomic molecule O2 . Inferred from the question is that nascent oxygen is O1 (a single atom of oxygen) and can be used with the idea being to do this: O2 + O1 = O3. Chemistry would have to be taking the day off for this to happen. And chemistry doesn't take a day off. Oxygen is not a solo act. It is not monatomic. It's like this: 3O2 + energy = 2O3. The reaction is endothermic; energy needs to be put in to make it happen. The energy comes from UV photons in photolysis or from good old high voltage in corona discharge reactions. Ozone is unstable and spontaneously reverts to diatomic oxygen like this: 2O3 = 3O2. Ozone cannot be prepared "manually" using "nascent" oxygen because oxygen writes the terms and conditions under which it will live. It will not live as O1 and therefor will not be available to combine with 1O2 to form 1O3. "Nascent" oxygen is more likely to join with another O1, and make O2. Not that O2 + O -> O3 doesn't happen, it does occasionally, with the help of other "third parties". See the link below for a technical paper on the functionally similar production of ozone in air using electrons to form "nascent oxygen".