Phase space structure of the hydrogen atom in a circularly polarized microwave field

We consider the problem of the hydrogen atom interacting with a circularly polarized microwave field, modeled as a perturbed Kepler problem. A remarkable feature of this system is that the electron can follow what we term erratic orbits before ionizing. In an erratic orbit the electron makes multipl...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Barrabés Vera, Esther, Ollé Torner, Mercè, Borondo, Florentino, Farrelly, David, Mondelo, Josep M.
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión enviada para evaluación y publicación
Fecha de publicación:2012
País:España
Institución:Varias* (Consorci de Biblioteques Universitáries de Catalunya, Centre de Serveis Científics i Acadèmics de Catalunya)
Repositorio:Recercat. Dipósit de la Recerca de Catalunya
OAI Identifier:oai:recercat.cat:10256/12691
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10256/12691
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Sistemes hamiltonians
Hamiltonian systems
Sistemes dinàmics diferenciables
Differentiable dynamical systems
Caos (Teoria de sistemes)
Chaotic behavior in system
Ionització
Ionization
Descripción
Sumario:We consider the problem of the hydrogen atom interacting with a circularly polarized microwave field, modeled as a perturbed Kepler problem. A remarkable feature of this system is that the electron can follow what we term erratic orbits before ionizing. In an erratic orbit the electron makes multiple large distance excursions from the nucleus with each excursion being followed by a close approach to the nucleus, where the interaction is large. Here we are interested in the mechanisms that explain this observation. We find that the manifolds associated with certain hyperbolic periodic orbits may play an important role, despite the fact that, in some respects, the dynamics is almost Keplerian. A study of some relevant invariant objects is carried out for different system parameters. The consequences of our findings for ionization of an electron by the external field are also discussed