Geometric Phase Effects in Ultracold Chemical Reactions

Abstract

The role of the geometric phase effect in chemical reaction dynamics has long been a topic of active experimental and theoretical investigations. The topic has received renewed interest in recent years in cold and ultracold chemistry where it was shown to play a decisive role in state-to-state chemical dynamics. We provide a brief review of these developments focusing on recent studies of O + OH and hydrogen exchange in the H + H 2 and D + HD reactions at cold and ultracold temperatures. Non-adiabatic effects in ultracold chemical dynamics arising from the conical intersection between two electronic potential energy surfaces are also briefly discussed. By taking the hydrogen exchange reaction as an illustrative example it is shown that the inclusion of the geometric phase effect captures the essential features of non-adiabatic dynamics at collision energies below the conical intersection.