Role of two-electron excitation-ionization processes in the ionization of lithium atoms by fast ion impact

Abstract

We study excitation and ionization in the 1.5-MeV/amu ${\mathrm{O}}^{8+}$-Li collision system, which was the subject of a recent reaction-microscope-type experiment [D. Fischer et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 113202 (2012)]. Starting from an independent-electron model based on determinantal wave functions and using a single-electron basis generator method calculation and a single-electron continuum distorted-wave with eikonal initial-state calculation, we show that pure single ionization of a lithium $K$-shell electron is too weak a process to explain the measured electron-energy-differential cross section. Rather, our analysis suggests that two-electron excitation-ionization processes occur and have to be taken into account when comparing with the data. Good agreement is obtained only if we replace the independent-electron calculation by an independent-event model for one of the excitation-ionization processes and also take a shake-off process into account.