ESA operating new Oxygen Simulator.

[Notebook]

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/S...ic_oxygen_generator_simulates_fire_in_the_sky

29 May 2017
ESA has begun operating a new simulator that fires a laser to generate a variety of oxygen normally encountered only in low orbits – and known to eat away at satellite surfaces.
The new facility is housed in the Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory, one of a suite of labs at ESA’s technical centre in the Netherlands, devoted to simulating every aspect of the space environment. Esa

 

[Notebook]

Excuse my ignorance, basic school education wasn't great.. Why the difference between molecular Oxygen, and atomic Oxygen?
Oxygen is an element and well defined?

N.

 

[MaverickSawyer]

The oxygen we breath is two oxygen atoms linked together. It's far less reactive with its surroundings that atomic oxygen, which is a single oxygen atom floating freely. It typically finds some other atom or molecule to latch onto as soon as possible, which in the uppermost fringes of the atmosphere, could be nitrogen, oxygen... or a passing satellite.
Ozone, on the other hand, is three oxygen atoms linked together in an unstable configuration.