Laser excitation of clusters: observables from electron emission

Abstract

We give a brief review of the theoretical description of photo-electron spectra (PES) and photo-angular distributions (PAD) and discuss a few selected, typical results. The description is based on time-dependent density-functional theory at the level of the local-density approximation augmented by a self-interaction correction which is crucial for a quantitative assessment of emission processes. Coordinate-space grids are used together with absorbing boundary conditions. We discuss the basic features and trends of PES and PAD for two typical test cases, the clusters Na8 and C60.