Inelastic Cross Sections for Molecules Interacting Through Dipole And/or Quadrupole Potentials

Abstract

Formal expressions for the lowest order inelastic contribution to the degeneracy averaged total cross section for both distinguishable and indistinguishable rigid diatomic molecules are obtained for molecules interacting through a multiple potential. Explicit expressions for the inleastic cross section are obtained for molecules interacting through permanent dipole-dipole, dipole-quadrupole, or quadrupole-quadrupole potentials. These results require the summation over only a single quantum number; the relative angular momentum quantum number. Thus, they are useful for analytic or numerical calculations