Laser-induced nonresonant nuclear excitation in muonic atoms

TL;DR

This paper investigates the theoretical possibility of exciting nuclei in muonic atoms using intense laser fields, deriving formulas for transition probabilities and comparing with other excitation methods to assess experimental feasibility.

Contribution

It provides a new analytical framework for laser-induced nuclear excitation in muonic atoms and evaluates its likelihood relative to other mechanisms.

Findings

Excitation probabilities are generally very small.

Derived closed-form expressions for electric multipole transitions.

Compared laser-induced excitation with other nuclear excitation mechanisms.

Abstract

Coherent nuclear excitation in strongly laser-driven muonic atoms is calculated. The nuclear transition is caused by the time-dependent Coulomb field of the oscillating charge density of the bound muon. A closed-form analytical expression for electric multipole transitions is derived and applied to various isotopes; the excitation probabilities are in general very small. We compare the process with other nuclear excitation mechanisms through coupling with atomic shells and discuss the prospects to observe it in experiment.