LASER-ASSISTED ELECTRON POLAR MOLECULE COLLISIONS

We extend our previous theory of electron-polar molecule scattering to study of the inelastic scattering, accompanied by the transfer of L photons, of fast electrons by HF molecules (in the electronic ground state) in the presence of an infrared laser beam taken in the dipole approximation. A non-perturbative Floquet method is used to describe the laser-molecule interaction while the non-perturbative Volkov solution is taken for the laser-projectile interaction. The electron-molecule interaction is treated within the first Born approximation. A detailed study is made of the vibrational excitation transitions v = 0 to v = 1, v = 0 to v = 2 and v = 0 to v = 3 in the HF molecule for the absorption of L photons. The collisional geometry is such that the laser polarization vector epsilon is parallel to the momentum transfer q.