Polarization correlations in radiative cascades following dielectronic recombination of high-Z ions

Abstract

We investigate the angular and polarization correlations between photons emitted in dielectronic recombination (DR) of initially hydrogen-like heavy ions. Computations are performed based on the density matrix approach and Dirac’s relativistic theory. Special attention is paid to the effects that arise from non-dipole terms in the expansion of the electron–photon interaction. To illustrate these effects, we present detailed calculations for the radiative cascades in K-LL DR of (initially) hydrogen-like uranium. Our computations show that the angle and polarization properties of the coincidently measured photons are significantly affected by a multipole-mixing between the leading electric-dipole (E1) and magnetic-quadrupole (M2) transitions.