Non-Hermitian quantum mechanics: Wave packet propagation on autoionizing potential energy surfaces

Interatomic and Intermolecular Coulombic Decay

Interatomic or intermolecular Coulombic decay (ICD) is a nonlocal electronic decay mechanism occurring in weakly bound matter. In an ICD process, energy released by electronic relaxation of an excited atom or molecule leads to ionization of a neighboring one via Coulombic electron interactions. ICD has been predicted theoretically in the mid nineties of the last century, and its existence has been confirmed experimentally approximately ten years later. Since then, a number of fundamental and applied aspects have been studied in this quickly growing field of research. This review provides an introduction to ICD and draws the connection to related energy transfer and ionization processes. The theoretical approaches for the description of ICD as well as the experimental techniques developed and employed for its investigation are described. The existing body of literature on experimental and theoretical studies of ICD processes in different atomic and molecular systems is reviewed.

Quantum Effects Dominating the Interatomic Coulombic Decay of an Extreme System

LiHe is an extreme open-shell system. It is among the weakest bound systems known, and its mean interatomic distance extends dramatically into the classical forbidden region. Upon 1s → 2p excitation of He, interatomic Coulombic decay (ICD) takes place in which the electronically excited helium atom relaxes and transfers its excess energy to ionize the neighboring lithium atom. A substantial part of the decay is found to be to the dissociation continuum producing Li⁺ and He atoms. The distribution of the kinetic energy released by the ICD products is found to be highly oscillatory. Its analysis reveals that quantum phase shifts between the decaying states and the dissociating final states are controlling this ICD reaction. The semiclassical reflection principle, which commonly explains ICD reactions, fails. The process is expected to be amenable to experiment.

Simple Closed-Form Expression for Penning Reaction Rate Coefficients for Cold Molecular Collisions by Non-Hermitian Time-Independent Adiabatic Scattering Theory

We present a simple expression and its derivation for reaction rate coefficients for cold anisotropic collision experiments based on adiabatic variational theory and time-independent non-Hermitian scattering theory. We demonstrate that only the eigenenergies of the resulting one-dimensional Schrödinger equation for different complex adiabats are required. The expression is applied to calculate the Penning ionization rate coefficients of an excited metastable helium atom with molecular hydrogen in an energy range spanning from hundreds of kelvins down to the millikelvin regime. Except for trivial quantities like the masses of the nuclei and the bond length of the diatomic molecule participating in the collision, one needs as input data only the complex potential energy surface (CPES). In calculations, we used recently obtained ab initio CPES by D. Bhattacharya et al. ( J. Chem. Theory Comput. 2017 , 13 , 1682 - 1690 ) without fitting parameters. The results show good accord with current measurements ( Nat. Phys. 2017 , 13 , 35 - 38 ).

Interatomic electronic decay driven by nuclear motion

The interatomic electronic decay after inner-valence ionization of a neon atom by a single photon in a neon-helium dimer is investigated. The excited neon atom relaxes via interatomic Coulombic decay and the excess energy is transferred to the helium atom and ionizes it. We show that the decay process is only possible if the dimer's bond stretches up to 6.2 Å, i.e., to more than twice the equilibrium interatomic distance of the neutral dimer. Thus, it is demonstrated that the electronic decay, taking place at such long distances, is driven by the nuclear motion.

Coincidence and total photoelectron spectra and their differences induced by internal degrees of freedom

Recent progress in experimental techniques have made it possible to measure photoelectron spectra in coincidence with particles emitted during the decay of the photoionized species. In this work it will be shown that, contrary to intuition, these coincident photoelectron spectra can be qualitatively different from the photoelectron spectra resulting when all photoelectrons are detected. In particular they carry information on the decay mechanism following photoionization as soon as the decay is influenced by internal degrees of freedom of the photoionized system. This is shown explicitly for the case of vibrational degrees of freedom of molecules and demonstrated with a model study.

On the unphysical impact of complex absorbing potentials on the Hamiltonian and its remedy

The introduction of complex absorbing potentials as numerical tools to stabilize or increase the efficiency of calculations based on wave-packet propagation or on eigenvalue problems has the drawback of causing a modification of the Hamilton operator of the problem. In this work the consequences of such a modification are analyzed and the corrections required in order to properly describe the original physical process are derived. As an example, the decay of excited molecular states is considered: it is shown that the standard time-independent expression for the decay spectrum loses its validity when a complex absorbing potential is introduced in the nuclear Hamilton operator of the problem. To remedy the situation, a new, very stable formula is derived and tested on relevant model studies. Numerical examples are discussed.

On the interatomic Coulombic decay in the Ne dimer

The interatomic Coulombic decay (ICD) in the Ne dimer is discussed in view of the recent experimental results. The ICD electron spectrum and the kinetic energy release of the Ne+ fragments resulting after Coulomb explosion of Ne2 (2+) are computed and compared to the measured ones. A very good agreement is found, confirming the dynamics predicted for this decay mechanism. The effect of the temperature on the electron spectrum is briefly investigated.