  The radiation hydrodynamic code CO5BOLD has been supplemented with the
time-dependent treatment of chemical reaction networks. Advection of particle
densities due to the hydrodynamic flow field is also included. The radiative
transfer is treated frequency-independently, i.e. grey, so far. The upgraded
code has been applied to two-dimensional simulations of carbon monoxide (CO) in
the non-magnetic solar photosphere and low chromosphere. For this purpose a
reaction network has been constructed, taking into account the reactions which
are most important for the formation and dissociation of CO under the physical
conditions of the solar atmosphere. The network has been strongly reduced to 27
reactions, involving the chemical species H, H2, C, O, CO, CH, OH, and a
representative metal. The resulting CO number density is highest in the cool
regions of the reversed granulation pattern at mid-photospheric heights and
decreases strongly above. There, the CO abundance stays close to a value of 8.3
on the usual logarithmic abundance scale with [H]=12 but is reduced in hot
shock waves which are a ubiquitous phenomenon of the model atmosphere. For
comparison, the corresponding equilibrium densities have been calculated, based
on the reaction network but also under assumption of instantaneous chemical
equilibrium by applying the Rybicki & Hummer (RH) code by Uitenbroek (2001).
Owing to the short chemical timescales, the assumption holds for a large
fraction of the atmosphere, in particular the photosphere. In contrast, the CO
number density deviates strongly from the corresponding equilibrium value in
the vicinity of chromospheric shock waves. Simulations with altered reaction
network clearly show that the formation channel via hydroxide (OH) is the most
important one under the conditions of the solar atmosphere.
