Possibility of giant enhancement of low-frequency non-resonant Rayleigh scattering by atomic systems within dense plasmas

Abstract

In this paper, we demonstrate the possibility of electron density-induced giant growth of non-resonant Rayleigh scattering of electromagnetic radiation (in the low-frequency limit) by atomic systems within dense plasmas. Non-relativistic quantum mechanical calculation is performed under electric dipole approximation, for elastic scattering of radiation by the ground states 1s of plasma-embedded hydrogen-like atomic ions treated within the framework of the ion-sphere model. The results indicate giant enhancement of the non-resonant (photon frequency ω being much smaller than the lowest resonance frequency ω1s−2p) Rayleigh cross-section by an order of magnitude, at (atomic system-specific) high enough plasma electron densities under present consideration. The Z−8-scaling of the non-resonant Rayleigh cross-section in free and isolated H-isoelectronic sequence of ions is shown to be broken in dense plasma environments.