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Collisional quenching of antiprotonic helium atoms in gaseous helium

Journal Article · · Physical Review. A
; ; ;  [1]
  1. Institute for Nuclear Research and Nuclear Energy, Tsarigradsko chaussee 72, Sofia 1784 (Bulgaria)
The cross sections and rates for quenching of thermalized antiprotonic helium atoms in binary collisions with ordinary helium atoms are calculated in perturbation theory and in the coupled-channel formalism at the temperature and the number density of the helium gas, T=6 K and N=10{sup 21} cm{sup -3}, respectively. It is shown that quenching is unlikely to be relevant for the metastable states of the antiprotonic helium atom with 32{<=}n{<=}40. Comparison with experiment shows a good quantitative agreement for the (n,l)=(39,35) state of antiprotonic helium and a large disagreement for the (37,34) state. As a byproduct of this work, the existence of a series of bound states of the He-p {sup 4}He{sup +} dimer is demonstrated numerically for n{>=}38.
OSTI ID:
20640986
Journal Information:
Physical Review. A, Journal Name: Physical Review. A Journal Issue: 4 Vol. 69; ISSN 1050-2947; ISSN PLRAAN
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English