Hannover 2010 – scientific programme

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A: Fachverband Atomphysik

A 1: COLTRIMS-based Collision Physics (exchanged with A4)

A 1.1: Invited Talk

Monday, March 8, 2010, 14:00–14:30, F 303

Quantum Dynamics Visualized by Reaction Microscopes: From intense virtual towards real attosecond photon fields — •Joachim Ullrich and Robert Moshammer — Max Planck Institut für Kernphysik; Heidelberg, Germany

Reaction Microscopes (REMI) image the vector momenta of low-energy electrons in coincidence with those of the ions (cold target recoil-ion momentum spectroscopy: COLTRIMS). They were developed in 1994 to explore the quantum dynamics of atomic or molecular fragmentation in fast heavy-ion collisions, motivated by tumour therapy at GSI. Ever since, kinematically complete experiments delivered surprising results, some of them understood by interpreting the field of the (relativistic) ion as a super-intense (up to 10**22 W/cm**2), attosecond virtual-photon field. About one decade later, the free-electron laser at Hamburg (FLASH) delivered first real-photon, few-femtosecond pulses. In summer 2009, up to 10**19 W/cm**2 at 2 keV photon energies were demonstrated at the LCLS (Stanford) with attosecond flashes coming into reach. Again, REMIs play a key role to investigate many-particle quantum dynamics: Multi-photon non-linear processes or time-dependent molecular reactions accessed in pioneering pump-probe experiments. In the talk, the two scenarios will be compared, key-experiments are highlighted and the rich future potential of the method is envisaged: Magneto-optical trap based REMIs in new storage rings promise achieving unprecedented momentum resolutions in ion collisions whereas REMIs completed by large-area scattered and fluorescent photon detectors deliver first exciting results at the LCLS.