Entangled trajectories during ionization of an H atom driven by n-cycle laser pulse

Abstract

We study the ionization of an H atom in a linearly polarized laser field with different optical cycle numbers by calculating the entangled trajectories in phase space. The results indicate that, for a two-cycle laser pulse, the entangled trajectory is simple owing to the simple laser electric distribution. As the number of optical cycles increases, the complexity of the laser electric field distribution, and subsequently, that of the entangled trajectories increase. From these entangled trajectories, re-scattering ionization can be observed. Further, we investigate the effect of quantum force on trajectories by comparing them with classical trajectories. We find that for few-cycle laser pulses (np=2 and 4), the effect of the quantum force is more distinct than classical behavior, whereas for longer laser pulses (np=6 and 8), it is quite similar to the classical behavior. Because of the quantum force, the final kinetic energy is slightly higher than that obtained by classical calculation. The different initial positions have some influence on the individual trajectories, but the individual trajectories still keep similar configuration to the mean trajectories.