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State-to-state dynamics of high-n Rydberg H-atom scattering with D2
Dongxu Dai1, Chia Chen Wang, Guorong Wu
1State Key Laboratory of Molecular Reaction Dynamics, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian, Liaoning 116023, People's Republic of China.
Abstract:
Full quantum-state resolved scattering of a highly excited Rydberg H atom with D2 has been carried out using the Rydberg H-atom time-of-flight method. A detailed analysis of the experimental results shows that both inelastic and reactive scatterings are significant in the Hn-D2 collisions, and nuclear spin is conserved in the inelastic scattering process. The differential cross sections for the Hn-D2 reaction measured in this work are then compared with the results for the H+ reaction with D2 in an ion beam scattering experiment. The remarkable agreement between the two experiments suggests that the Fermi independent-collider model is valid even at the full quantum state-to-state scattering level, providing a promising tool for investigating the state-to-state dynamics of certain elementary ion-molecule reactions.
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