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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Guo, Xuyang, Madison, Kirk W., Booth, James L., Krems, Roman V.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
Subjects:
Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2409.00273
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author Guo, Xuyang
Madison, Kirk W.
Booth, James L.
Krems, Roman V.
author_facet Guo, Xuyang
Madison, Kirk W.
Booth, James L.
Krems, Roman V.
contents Thermal rate coefficients for some atomic collisions have been observed to be remarkably independent of the details of interatomic interactions at short range. This makes these rate coefficients universal functions of the long-range interaction parameters and masses, which was previously exploited to develop a self-defining atomic sensor for ambient pressure. Here, we employ rigorous quantum scattering calculations to examine the response of thermally averaged rate coefficients for atom-atom collisions to changes in the interaction potentials. We perform a comprehensive analysis of the universality, and the boundaries thereof, by treating the quantum scattering observables as probabilistic predictions determined by a distribution of interaction potentials. We show that there is a characteristic change of the resulting distributions of rate coefficients, separating light, few-electron atoms and heavy, polarizable atoms. We produce diagrams that illustrate the boundaries of the thermal collision universality at different temperatures and provide guidance for future experiments seeking to exploit the universality.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2409_00273
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Boundaries of universality of thermal collisions for atom-atom scattering
Guo, Xuyang
Madison, Kirk W.
Booth, James L.
Krems, Roman V.
Atomic Physics
Computational Physics
Quantum Physics
Thermal rate coefficients for some atomic collisions have been observed to be remarkably independent of the details of interatomic interactions at short range. This makes these rate coefficients universal functions of the long-range interaction parameters and masses, which was previously exploited to develop a self-defining atomic sensor for ambient pressure. Here, we employ rigorous quantum scattering calculations to examine the response of thermally averaged rate coefficients for atom-atom collisions to changes in the interaction potentials. We perform a comprehensive analysis of the universality, and the boundaries thereof, by treating the quantum scattering observables as probabilistic predictions determined by a distribution of interaction potentials. We show that there is a characteristic change of the resulting distributions of rate coefficients, separating light, few-electron atoms and heavy, polarizable atoms. We produce diagrams that illustrate the boundaries of the thermal collision universality at different temperatures and provide guidance for future experiments seeking to exploit the universality.
title Boundaries of universality of thermal collisions for atom-atom scattering
topic Atomic Physics
Computational Physics
Quantum Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2409.00273