Eur. Phys. J. D (2013) 67: 4
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2012-30483-7

Regular Article

Relativistic theory for radiative ionization of light atoms by heavy ions

¹ Mathematics Institute, University of Munich, Theresienstrasse 39, 80333 Munich, Germany
² Center for Advanced Studies, St. Petersburg State Polytechnical University, Polytekhnicheskaya 29, St. Petersburg 195251, Russia
³ Institute of Physics, Heidelberg University, Im Neuenheimer Feld 226, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany

^a e-mail: dj@mathematik.uni-muenchen.de

Received: 2 August 2012
Received in final form: 22 October 2012
Published online: 24 January 2013

Abstract

The capture of a quasifree target electron into the continuum of a heavy, fast projectile ion with simultaneous photon emission, known as radiative ionization (RI), is calculated within the relativistic impulse approximation, applying the partial-wave analysis. Comparison is made with the semirelativistic Sommerfeld-Maue (SM) theory and it is shown that there are considerable differences in the absolute cross sections for heavy projectiles and high collision energies. Absolute photon spectra, measured in the collisions of 96.6 MeV/amu U⁹²⁺ + H₂ and 213 MeV/amu U⁹¹⁺ + H₂, are well reproduced by the fully relativistic approach.