UP, 3UP, 11UP: Above-Threshold Ionization Revisited

Baorui Yanga, K.J. Schaferb, B. Walkera, K.C. Kulanderb,c, L.F. Dimauroa and P. Agostinid aChemistry Department, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, New York 11973, USA bLawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California, USA cJoint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA dService de Recherches sur les Surfaces et l'Irradiation de la Matière, Centre d'Etudes Nucléaires de Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France

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Angular distributions of very high energy photoelectrons from Xe and Kr, excited by a 50 ps, 1054 um laser, are presented. In Xe strong, narrow structures 45° off the polarization axis appear on above-threshold ionization peaks within a limited energy range centered around 9UP, where UP is the intensity-dependent ponderomotive energy. Under the same conditions the effect is much weaker in krypton. These structures are discussed using a very simple classical model as well as sophisticated single active electron calculations and the Keldysh-Faisal-Reiss theory. We conclude these structures are the result of single-electron dynamics involving rescattering of a tunneling component of the continuum wave function.

DOI: 10.12693/APhysPolA.86.41 PACS numbers: 32.80.Rm, 31.90.+s, 32.80.Fb