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arXiv:1508.05681

Variational Calculations of Positronium Scattering with Hydrogen

Denton Woods

Published Dec 1, 2015• 2 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Positronium-hydrogen (Ps-H) scattering is of interest, as it is a fundamental four-body Coulomb problem. We have investigated low-energy Ps-H scattering below the Ps(n=2) excitation threshold using the Kohn variational method and variants of the method with a trial wavefunction that includes highly correlated Hylleraas-type short-range terms. We give an elegant formalism that combines all Kohn-type variational methods into a single form. Along with this, we have also developed a general formalism for Kohn-type matrix elements that allows us to evaluate arbitrary partial waves with a single codebase. Computational strategies we have developed and use in this work will also be discussed.With these methods, we have computed phase shifts for the first six partial waves for both the singlet and triplet states. The 1S and 1P phase shifts are highly accurate results and could potentially be viewed as benchmark results. Resonance positions and widths for the 1S-, 1P-, 1D-, and 1F-waves have been calculated.We present elastic integrated, elastic differential, and momentum transfer cross sections using all six partial waves and note interesting features of each. We use multiple effective range theories, including several that explicitly take into account the long-range van der Waals interaction, to investigate scattering lengths for the 1,3S and 1,3P partial waves and effective ranges for the 1,3S-wave.

DOI
10.12794/metadc822803

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Positronium-hydrogen (Ps-H) scattering is of interest, as it is a fundamental four-body Coulomb problem. We have investigated low-energy Ps-H scattering below the Ps(n=2) excitation threshold using the Kohn variational method and variants of the method with a trial wavefunction that includes highly correlated Hylleraas-type short-range terms. We give an elegant formalism that combines all Kohn-type variational methods into a single form. Along with this, we have also developed a general formalism for Kohn-type matrix elements that allows us to evaluate arbitrary partial waves with a single codebase. Computational strategies we have developed and use in this work will also be discussed.With these methods, we have computed phase shifts for the first six partial waves for both the singlet and triplet states. The 1S and 1P phase shifts are highly accurate results and could potentially be viewed as benchmark results. Resonance positions and widths for the 1S-, 1P-, 1D-, and 1F-waves have been calculated.We present elastic integrated, elastic differential, and momentum transfer cross sections using all six partial waves and note interesting features of each. We use multiple effective range theories, including several that explicitly take into account the long-range van der Waals interaction, to investigate scattering lengths for the 1,3S and 1,3P partial waves and effective ranges for the 1,3S-wave.
We investigate the four-body Coulomb process of low-energy elastic positronium-hydrogen (Ps-H) scattering below the Ps(n=2n=2n=2) excitation threshold using scattering wave functions that include Hylleraas-type correlation terms. Using the complex Kohn variational method, we compute phase shifts through the 1,3H^{1,3}H1,3H wave and obtain highly accurate 1,3S^{1,3}S1,3S- and 1,3P^{1,3}P1,3P-wave phase shifts. The complex Kohn variational results compare well to a number of other calculations for this system. We present elastic differential, elastic integrated, and momentum transfer cross sections, and for the singlet, resonances through the 1F^{1}F1F wave. The differential cross section exhibits interesting features, including a change from slightly backward peaked to forward peaked scattering as the energy of the incident positronium increases and rich structure due to multiple resonances near the Ps(n=2n=2n=2) threshold. We also give a detailed analysis of the scattering lengths and effective ranges using multiple effective range theories.
We have continued our investigation into the elastic scattering of positronium atoms by hydrogen atoms, extending the work to include the spin-one (triplet) state of the two electrons. Once again we have extracted the SSS-wave phase shifts from normalizable trial functions by examining the spatial behavior of the center-of-mass wave functions. An effective-range expansion linear in the positronium energy fits the results very well and leads to a scattering length ${a}^{(\ensuremath{-})}\ensuremath{\simeq}2.36{a}_{0}$, compared with the static result ${a}^{(\ensuremath{-})}=2.476{a}_{0}$ of Hara and Fraser. The SSS-wave total and ortho-para conversion cross sections are calculated by making use of both 1S^{1}S1S and 3S^{3}S3S results. In the 3S^{3}S3S case, we see no indication of any resonances below the excitation threshold at 5.1 eV.
Calculations are reported for positronium (Ps) scattering by atomic hydrogen (H) in the energy range 0--6.5 eV in a coupled-pseudostate approximation in which excitation and ionization channels of both the Ps and the H are taken into account. The approximation contains an accurate representation of the van der Waals coefficient. Results are presented for phase shifts, scattering lengths, effective ranges, and various cross sections including partial wave, total, and ortho-para conversion cross sections. An analysis of the possible spin transitions is provided and the energy of the positronium hydride (PsH) bound state is determined. Substantial differences are found from earlier work within the frozen target approximation, now clearly confirming the importance of target excitation channels. Good agreement is obtained with recent calculations of S-wave phase shifts and scattering lengths using the stabilization method. Convergence to the exact binding energy for PsH appears to be slow. Resonances corresponding to unstable states of the positron orbiting ${\mathrm{H}}^{\ensuremath{-}}$ are seen in the electronic spin singlet partial waves. The importance of the ${\mathrm{H}}^{\ensuremath{-}}$ formation channel is discussed.
The stochastic variational method (SVM) is used in conjunction with stabilization ideas in order to compute low-energy phase shifts. The method is tested by applying it to a simple model problem, and to s-wave positron-hydrogen scattering. The SVM is then applied to the calculation of the s- and p-wave phase shifts for Ps-H scattering. The scattering lengths obtained were 4.34a0{4.34a}_{0}4.34a0​ for the electronic-spin-singlet state and 2.22a0{2.22a}_{0}2.22a0​ for the triplet state. The present scattering lengths are probably accurate to $\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}3%$ and are the most accurate that have so far been computed for the Ps-H systems.
The scattering of orthopositronium (Ps) by hydrogen atoms has been investigated in a five-state coupled-channel model allowing for Ps(1s)H(2s,2p)\mathrm{Ps}(1s)\mathrm{H}(2s,2p)Ps(1s)H(2s,2p) and Ps(2s,2p)H(1s)\mathrm{Ps}(2s,2p)\mathrm{H}(1s)Ps(2s,2p)H(1s) excitations using a recently proposed electron-exchange model potential. The higher (n> 3)(n>~3)(n> 3) excitations and ionization of the Ps atom are calculated using the first Born approximation. Calculations are reported of scattering lengths, phase shifts, elastic, Ps and H excitation, and total cross sections. Remarkable correlations are observed between the S-wave Ps-H binding energy and the singlet scattering length, effective range, and resonance energy obtained in various model calculations. These correlations suggest that if a Ps-H dynamical model yields the correct result for one of these four observables, it is expected to lead to the correct result for the other three. The present model, which is constructed so as to reproduce the Ps-H resonance at 4.01 eV, automatically yields a Ps-H bound state at $\ensuremath{-}1.05$ eV that compares well with the accurate value of $\ensuremath{-}1.067$ eV. The model leads to a singlet scattering length of 3.72a0{3.72a}_{0}3.72a0​ and effective range of 1.67a0,{1.67a}_{0},1.67a0​, whereas the correlations suggest the precise values of 3.50a0{3.50a}_{0}3.50a0​ and 1.65a0{1.65a}_{0}1.65a0​ for these observables, respectively.