Regular Article

Rotational excitation of tetrahedral and octahedral molecules caused by electron and positron impact

Momentum transfer, integral and differential cross sections^⋆

Departamento de Fsica, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, 88040-900 Florianópolis, Santa Catarina, Brazil

^a e-mail: marcosbarp@gmail.com

Received: 12 September 2019
Received in final form: 18 October 2019
Published online: 26 November 2019

Abstract

Rotational excitation cross sections of tetrahedral and octahedral molecules caused by low energy positron/electron impact are the subject of this work. We developed a scattering model considering the Born approximation and the asymptotic multipole potential. These assumptions permitted us to achieve analytical expressions for rotational integral, momentum transfer and differential cross sections. We have found good agreement for positron and marginal agreement for electron interactions. The model can be improved with the inclusion of exchange effects and the distortion of the scattering wave function.