Elastic scattering of alkali atoms from iodine atoms and molecules at thermal energies

Abstract

Abstract High-resolution, small-angle measurements of the elastic differential cross sections have been made for the systems K/I and K/I2. In all cases the structure at small angles is found to arise predominantly from collisions occurring along the adiabatic potential. The off-diagonal matrix element of the electronic hamiltonian between the covalent and ionic states in the K/I system is found to be ∼ 6×10-15 ergs.