New_Website/research.html

1 line
13 KiB
HTML

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="application/xhtml+xml; charset=iso-8859-1" />
<title>Theory of Cluster Dynamics</title>
<link href="style.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
</head>
<body>
<div id="container">
<div id="header">
<div id="menu">
<div id="navMenu">
<ul>
<li style="margin-top:1px;border-top:1px solid #B0C4DE; "><a href="index.html">Home</a></li>
<li><a href="intro.html">Introductory Overview</a></li>
<li><a href="research.html">Scientific Information</a></li>
<li><a href="staff.html">Staff</a></li>
<li><a href="publications.html">Publications/Talks</a></li>
<li><a href="contact.html">Contact</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>
<div id="image">
<p><font size="6" color="white"><b>Theory of Cluster Dynamics</b></font><font
size="5"><br />
</font><font size="6"> </font><font size="5">The Toulouse -
Erlangen Collaboration</font></p>
</div>
</div>
<div id="content">
<div id="WideContent">
<div id="contentBoxWide">
<div id="contentBoxHeader">
<p>Our Research Activities</p>
</div>
<!-- <div id="contentBoxContent">
</div>
--> </div>
</div>
<div id="contentBoxWide"><!--
<div style="width:250px;float:left;"> <div id="cBoxEnv">
<div id="cBoxHeader"> A popular guide
</div> <div id="cBoxContent">
<p>
For non-experts we provide some interesting basic and popular information on our research activities: </p>
<ul> <li>
<p><a href="intro.html">What are clusters?</a></p> </li>
<li> <p><a href="dynamics.html">Why studying cluster dynamics?</a></p>
</li> <li>
<p><a href="ourdynamics/our_dynamics.html">How we deal with cluster dynamics</a></p> </li>
</ul>
</div>
</div> </div>
-->
<div style="width: 770px; float: left;">
<div id="cBoxEnv">
<div id="cBoxHeader"> A scientific guide </div>
<div id="cBoxContent">
<div style="text-align: justify;"> </div>
<div id="cBoxContent">
<div style="text-align: justify;"> </div>
<p style="text-align: justify;">The core of our activities
concerns
the theoretical analysis of the dynamics of molecules and
clusters.
The method of choice for most of our studies is
time-dependent density
functional theory. One can sort our activities along three
major
directions of research: intrinsic dynamical system
properties
investigated with moderate external excitations
(perturbative regime),
response to strong external fields analyzed with a bunch of
different
observables taking care particularly of information from
electron
emission, and development of the necessary numerical as well
as
theoretical tools. The majority of applications deals with
free
molecules and clusters. One branch of studies deals also
with clusters
in contact with polarizable media (raregas matrices,
insulating
surfaces).
</p>
<p><b><a href="tddft-md/formal.html">Theoretical developments</a>
</b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Understanding of cluster
dynamics
requires elaborate theoretical tools.
Time-Dependent Density Functional Theory (TDDFT) represents
here a robust starting point
which allows to address a great variety of situations. We
use TDDFT at various
levels of sophistication. Basis is the most efficient<a href="tddft-md/formal.html">,
Time-Dependent
Local-Density Approximation (TDLDA)</a>. It is augmented
by
a Self-Interaction Correction (SIC) for a proper description
of
electron emission and associated observables. Ionic motion
is
propagated simultaneously by classical Molecular Dynamics
(MD)
amounting together to TDLDA-MD. Very energetic processes
allow
semi-classical approximations for which we use mostly the
Vlasov-LDA
approximation. The latter allows a relatively simple
extension by
dynamical correlations with a collision term which accounts
properly
for the Pauli principle leading to the
Vlasov-Uehling-Uhlenbeck (VUU)
equation. <br />
Recent developments focus on the implementation of such
dynamical correlations in the fully quantum mechanical
framework of
TDLDA. A robust, phenomenological route is followed with the
Relaxation-Time Approximation (RTA) known from bulk matter
and
implemented now for finite Fermion systems. An exact
evaluation of the
quantum-mechanical collision is prohibitively expensive.
With
Stochastic TDLDA (STDLDA), we render the case manageable by
a
stochastic evaluation of the collisions. Full STDLDA can
cope even
with large fluctuations of the mean field as they are
typical for
violent dynamical processes. Further savings are possible in
the
regime of small statistical fluctuations which allows to use
one
average mean field delivering Average STDLDA (ASTDLDA). In
any case,
the dynamical correlations thus implemented allow a
pertinent
description of dissipation in electron dynamics which
becomes an
important ingredient at longer times (in metal clusters
typically &gt; 50
fs). <br />
Numerically, we solve TDLDA and related approaches in
coordinate-space grid representations, fully
three-dimensional if
necessary and in the much faster cylindrically symmetric 2D
grid if
the case allows. All grids are surrounded bands generating
absorbing
boundary conditions to allow a correct description and
analysis of
electron emission.
</p>
<p>
<b><a href="analysis/detail1.html">Intrinsic dynamical
properties of molecules and clusters
</a></b>
</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">At moderate perturbations, the
system
response dominantly reflects its own (structure and
dynamical)
properties. The most prominent feature is the optical
response which
characterizes the coupling of photons to the electrons of
the
system. We obtain it from TDLDA driven in the regime of weak
perturbations [<a href="publications.html#Cal97">Cal97</a>]. As optical
response is the doorway to almost all further dynamical
processes, it
is regularly scanned before starting with more involved
scenarios (see
below).
<br />
The ionic dynamics of molecules and clusters is explored by
pump and
probe scenarios, again driven in the regime of moderate
excitations to
explore the system as such without too much perturbation.
</p>
<p>
<b><a href="analysis/detail2.html">
Free clusters in strong external fields</a></b></p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">
When applying stronger external fields, a world of dynamical
scenarios
is opened as, e.g., multi-photon ionization, higher harmonic
generation, multi-fragmentation, or Coulomb explosion [<a href="publications.html#Fen10">Fen10</a>]. <br />
A large part of our activities is concerned with dynamical
information
which can be obtained from electron emission. The simplest
and most
widely used observable is the net ionization, often in
connection with
time resolved measurements. The trends of ionization with
systematically varied laser parameters (frequency,
intensity, pulse
length, delay times) contain already a lot of valuable
information. More can be obtained by looking at the emitted
electrons
in detail collecting the distributions of kinetic energies,
called
Photo-Electron Spectra (PES), or angular directions, in the
ideal case
even both together as Angular Resolved PES (ARPES). Our
numerical
tools (coordinate-space representation with absorbing
boundary
conditions) to solve TDLDA allow a rather convenient
computation of
all these detailed distributions, if needed even in time
resolved
manner. We apply them to simulate measurements in raregas
atom, metal
clusters, and C<sub>60</sub> [<a href="publications.html#Wop15">Wop15</a>].
<br />
The detailed distributions ARPES indicate indicate
limitations of a
mere mean-field description as in TDLDA. They overestimate,
e.g., the
forward/backward emission along the laser polarization axis.
This
calls for dissipation in electron dynamics as it is given by
dynamical
correlations. This is the main line of present development
and
applications. <br />
</p>
<p><b><a href="tddft-md/detailQMMM.html">Molecules and
clusters in
contact with a polarizable environment</a></b>
</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">Clusters can be more easily
handled
experimentally when they are produced in contact with an
environment
(deposited on a surface or embedded in a matrix). Thus a
large amount
experimental data was produced under these conditions. We
have thus
developed a simplified description of the environment in
terms of
classical Molecular Mechanics (MM) taking care to include a
proper
modeling of its dynamical polarizability. This is coupled to
the
standard Quantum-Mechanical (QM) handling of the electron
cloud in the
active molecule or cluster, yielding together QM/MM method.
This
hierarchical approach allows us to explore various dynamical
scenarios, as optical response of deposited clusters,
deposition
processes, irradiation of embedded clusters by an intense
laser field,
etc with sufficiently large samples for the environment [<a href="publications.html#Din09">Din09</a>].
</p>
</div>
<p style="text-align: justify;"></p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div id="footer">
<p></p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</body>
</html>