Mutual neutralization in Li${}^{+}$-D${}^{-}$ collisions: a combined experimental and theoretical study

Abstract

We present a combined experimental and theoretical study of the mutual neutralization process in collisions of lithium ions (Li+) with deuterium anions (D-) at collision energies below 1 eV. We employ a merged-beam apparatus to determine total and state-to-state mutual neutralization cross sections. We perform nuclear dynamics calculations using the multi-channel Landau-Zener model based on accurate ab initio molecular data. We obtain an excellent agreement between the experimental and theoretical results over the energy range covered in this work. We show that the basis sets used in the ab initio calculations have a limited influence on the total cross section, but strongly impacts the results obtained for the partial cross sections or the reaction branching ratios. This demonstrates the important role of high-precision measurements to validate the theoretical approaches used to study gas-phase reactive processes. Finally, we compute mutual neutralization rate coefficients for Li+ + H- and Li+ + D-, and discuss their significance for astrochemistry models.

revised version, to appear in ApJ

References in corpus (6)

• Inelastic H+Li and H^-+Li^+ collisions and non-LTE Li I line formation in stellar atmospheres
• Accurate abundance analysis of late-type stars: advances in atomic physics
• Excitation and charge transfer in low-energy hydrogen atom collisions with neutral atoms: Theory, comparisons, and application to Ca
• Ab initio calculation of the 66 low lying electronic states of HeH${}^{+}$: adiabatic and diabatic representations
• Evidence for two-electron processes in the mutual neutralization of O- with O+ and N+ at Subthermal Collision Energies
• Excitation and charge transfer in low-energy hydrogen atom collisions with neutral oxygen

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Mutual neutralisation in Li${}^{+}$+H${}^{-}$/D${}^{-}$ and Na${}^{+}$+H${}^{-}$/D${}^{-}$ collisions: Implications of experimental results for non-LTE modelling of stellar spectra
• An ultracold heavy Rydberg system formed from ultra-long-range molecules bound in a stairwell potential
• Mutual neutralization of C${}_{60}^{+}$ and C${}_{60}^{-}$ ions: Excitation energies and state-selective rate coefficients