Recently, a research team led by Prof. LIU Xiaojun at Innovation Academy for Precision Measurement Science and Technology of Chinese Academy of Sciences cooperated with other researchers and reported on an experimental and theoretical study of the ionization-fragmentation dynamics of argon dimers in intense few-cycle laser pulses with a tagged carrier-envelope phase. We find that a field-driven electron transfer process from one argon atom across the system boundary to the other argon atom triggers subcycle electron-electron interaction dynamics in the neighboring atom. This attosecond electron-transfer process between distant entities and its implications manifests itself as a distinct phase-shift between the measured asymmetry of electron emission curves of the Ar++Ar2+ and Ar2++Ar2+ fragmentation channels. This letter discloses a strong-field route to controlling the dynamics in molecular compounds through the excitation of electronic dynamics on a distant molecule by driving intermolecular electron-transfer processes.
Ar(n,m) with (n,m)={(1,1),(1,2),(2,2)}. Arrows mark peaks due to electron recapture, shaded areas highlight the peaks resulting from Coulomb explosion at Req.
This work was published in Physical Review Letters. PhD student WANG Yanlan at University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (institute: Innovation Academy for Precision Measurement Science and Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences) is the first author. Prof. LIU Xiaojun and Prof. Kitzler-Zeiler at Technische Universität Wien are the corresponding author. Prof. LIU is also a doctoral supervisor at University of Chinese Academy of Sciences.
