Double-electron ionization driven by inhomogeneous fields

Abstract

Authors may self-archive the author’s accepted manuscript of their articles on their own websites. Authors may also deposit this version of the article in any repository, provided it is only made publicly available 12 months after official publication or later. He/ she may not use the publisher's version (the final article), which is posted on SpringerLink and other Springer websites, for the purpose of self-archiving or deposit. Furthermore, the author may only post his/her version provided acknowledgement is given to the original source of publication and a link is inserted to the published article on Springer's website. The link must be provided by inserting the DOI number of the article in the following sentence: “The final publication is available at Springer via https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00340-017-6672-4"Electron–electron correlation effects play a crucial role in our understanding of sequential (SDI) and non-sequential double ionization (NSDI) mechanisms. Here, we present a theoretical study of NSDI driven by plasmonic-enhanced spatial inhomogeneous fields. By numerically solving the time-dependent Schrödinger equation for a linear reduced model of He and a double-electron time-evolution probability analysis, we provide evidence for enhancement effects in NSDI showing that the double ionization yield at lower laser peak intensities is increased due to the spatial inhomogeneous character of plasmonic-enhanced field. The change in the emission direction of the double-ion as a function of the field inhomogeneity degree demonstrates that plasmonic-enhanced fields could configure a reliable instrument to control the ion emission. Furthermore, our quantum mechanical model, as well as classical trajectory Monte Carlo simulations, show that inhomogeneous fields are as well as a useful tool for splitting the binary and recoil processes in the rescattering scenario.This work was supported by the project ELI-Extreme Light Infrastructure-phase 2 (Project No. CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/ 15_008/0000162) from European Regional Development Fund, Spanish MINECO (National Plan grants FIS2011-30465-C02-01, FOQUS No. FIS2013-46768-P, FISICATEAMO FIS2016-79508-P and Severo Ochoa Excellence Grant No. SEV-2015-0522), the Generalitat de Catalunya (SGR 874 and CERCA/Program) and Fundació Privada Cellex Barcelona. N.S. was supported by the Erasmus Mundus Doctorate Program Europhotonics (Grant No. 159224-1-2009-1-FR-ERA MUNDUS-EMJD). N.S., A.C., and M.L. acknowledge ERC AdG OSYRIS, EU FETPRO QUIC and National Science Centre, Poland—Symfonia Grant 2016/20/W/ST4/00314. A. S. L. acknowledges Max Planck Center for Attosecond Science (MPC-AS). J. A. P.-H. acknowledges to the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitivi- dad (FURIAM Project No. FIS2013-47741-R and PALMA project FIS2016- 81056-R) and Laserlab-Europe (EU-H2020 654148). L.O. acknowledges valuable input from Andre Staudte. The authors thankfully acknowledge the computer resources at MareNostrum, technical expertise and assistance provided by the Barcelona Supercomputing Center and the Red Española de Supercomputación (RES)Peer Reviewe