CAPTURE OF POLARIZED ELECTRONS INTO EXCITED TERMS OF FAST ATOMS DURING GRAZING SURFACE COLLISIONS

Fast ions are scattered from magnetized surfaces under grazing angles of incidence. During the interaction with the surface charge exchange is effective and results in a population of stable and excited atomic terms. This capture of electrons is characterized by anisotropic distributions of atomic orbital angular momenta and in addition - for magnetized targets - by anisotropic distributions of electronic spins. We will discuss in some detail, how these anisotropic distributions can be studied via the analysis of the state of polarization of the fluorescent light, emitted in electronic transitions from excited terms of free atoms after the impact with the surface. We show that a defined variation of the magnetization of the target affects the polarization of the emitted light in a characteristic way, which allows to deduce the electronic spin polarization of the atoms. The method implies some perspectives with respect to the study of magnetic properties of the vacuum-solid interface well above the topmost layer of surface atoms.