Rovibrational structure of the Ar-CO complex based on a novel three-dimensional ab initio potential J. Chem. Phys. 117, 6562 (2002); 10.1063/1.1493180 This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation. The viscomagnetic effect for two linear molecules, N 2 and CO 2 , has been calculated in the dilute-gas limit directly from the most accurate ab initio intermolecular potential energy surfaces presently available. The calculations were performed by means of the classical trajectory method in the temperature range from 70 K to 3000 K for N 2 and 100 K to 2000 K for CO 2 , and agreement with the available experimental data is exceptionally good. Above room temperature, where no experimental data are available, the calculations provide the first quantitative information on the magnitude and the behavior of the viscomagnetic effect for these gases. In the presence of a magnetic field, the viscosities of nitrogen and carbon dioxide decrease by at most 0.3% and 0.7%, respectively. The results demonstrate that the viscomagnetic effect is dominated by the contribution of the jj polarization at all temperatures, which shows that the alignment of the rotational axes of the molecules in the presence of a magnetic field is primarily responsible for the viscomagnetic effect. C 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.[http://dx