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Published on: July 27, 2018
Exciton autoionization in ion-induced electron emission
N Bajales1, L Cristina, S Mendoza
1Instituto de Desarrollo Tecnológico para la Industria Química, CONICET, Santa Fe, Argentina.
Abstract:
We report on measurements of electron emission spectra from surfaces of highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) excited by 1-5 keV He+ and Li+ which, for He+, exhibit a previously unreported high-energy structure. Through a full quantum dynamic description that allows for the calculation of neutralization and electron-hole pair excitation, we show that these high-energy electrons can arise from autoionization of excitons formed by electron promotion to conduction band states close to the vacuum level. The same calculation explains the observed absence of high-energy excitons for Li+ on HOPG.
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