Collision dynamics of three interacting atoms: Vibrationalndash;rotational excitation in atomndash;diatom hyperthermal collisions

摘要

We describe atomndash;diatom collisions at hyperthermal energies within the theory of threehyphen;body scattering. We show how one can treat angular momentum coupling and rotational excitation to low order in a multiplehyphen;collision expansion. The emphasis here is in the use of accurate twohyphen;atom transition amplitudes and form factors, and on impulse and peaking approximations with simple interaction potentials. We present results for differential cross sections as functions of final rotational quantum numbersjffor Li+ndash;CO and Li+ndash;N2at several center of mass angles in the eV region of collision energies. Form factors are also shown for varyingjf, and are discussed in terms of simple overlap models in momentum space.