Fully differential study of wave packet scattering in ionization of helium by proton impact

Abstract

We present a fully differential study of projectile coherence effects in ionization in p + He collisions. The experimental data are qualitatively reproduced by a non-perturbative ab initio time-dependent model, which treats the projectile coherence properties in terms of a wave packet. A comparison between first- and higher-order treatments shows that the observed interference structures are primarily due to a coherent superposition of different impact parameters leading to the same scattering angle. Higher-order contributions have a significant effect on the interference term.