Enhancement of double auger decay probability in xenon clusters irradiated with a soft-x-ray laser pulse.
The interaction of large Xe clusters with a soft x-ray laser pulse having a wavelength of 13.9 nm and an intensity of up to 2x10(10) W/cm2 was investigated using a time-of-flight ion mass spectrometer. The corresponding laser photon energy was sufficiently high to photoionize Xe 4d innershell electrons. It was found that Xe3+ ions (which result from double Auger decay of 4d vacancies) became the dominant final ionic product with increasing cluster size and x-ray intensity. This is in contrast to the results of synchrotron radiation experiments involving free Xe atoms, in which Xe2+ is the dominant resultant ion species. Possible mechanisms responsible for the enhancement of the double Auger transition probability in x-ray laser and cluster interaction are discussed.
Graduate School of Engineering, Hiroshima University, Kagamiyama 1-4-1, Higashi-Hiroshima, Hiroshima, 739-8527, Japan.
S
S
Namba
N
N
Hasegawa
M
M
Nishikino
T
T
Kawachi
M
M
Kishimoto
K
K
Sukegawa
M
M
Tanaka
Y
Y
Ochi
K
K
Takiyama
K
K
Nagashima