Quantum-quasiclassical analysis of center-of-mass nonseparability in hydrogen atom stimulated by strong laser fields *

Abstract

Abstract We have developed a quantum-quasiclassical computational scheme for quantitative treating of the nonseparable quantum–classical dynamics of the 6D hydrogen atom in a strong laser pulse. In this approach, the electron is treated quantum mechanically and the center-of-mass (CM) motion classically. Thus, the Schrödinger equation for the electron and the classical Hamilton equations for the CM variables, nonseparable due to relativistic effects stimulated by strong laser fields, are integrated simultaneously. In this approach, it is natural to investigate the idea of using the CM- velocity spectroscopy as a classical ‘build-up’ set up for detecting the internal electron quantum dynamics. We have performed such an analysis using the hydrogen atom in linearly polarized laser fields as an example and found a strong correlation between the CM kinetic energy distribution after a laser pulse and the spectral density of electron kinetic energy. This shows that it is possible to detect the quantum dynamics of an electron by measuring the distribution of the CM kinetic energy.