Molecular-orbital theory for the stopping power of atoms in the low velocity regime:the case of helium in alkali metals

TL;DR

This paper introduces a linear-combination-of-atomic-orbitals method to analyze the stopping power of slow helium ions in alkali metals, showing good agreement with existing calculations and highlighting variations in channeled atoms.

Contribution

It presents a new theoretical approach for calculating stopping power of slow ions in metals, specifically applying it to helium in alkali metals.

Findings

Good agreement with local-density-approximation calculations.

Significant variations in stopping power for channeled atoms.

Method effectively analyzes low-velocity ion interactions in metals.

Abstract

A free-parameter linear-combination-of-atomic-orbitals approach is presented for analyzing the stopping power of slow ions moving in a metal. The method is applied to the case of He moving in alkali metals. Mean stopping powers for He present a good agreement with local-density-approximation calculations. Our results show important variations in the stopping power of channeled atoms with respect to their mean values.