Radiative electron capture as a collision-stimulated transition between electron states dressed by the radiation field

We consider radiative electron capture (REC) in fast nonrelativistic collisions of light atomic particles. In order to treat the process we adapted a formalism in which the REC is viewed as collision-stimulated transitions between electron states of different particles dressed by the radiation field. The formalism leads to frame-independent cross sections. Within the formalism the problem of defining the charge current operator does not arise. The results obtained for REC are close to those of Briggs and Dettmann (Briggs J S and Dettmann K 1974 Phys. Rev. Lett. 33 1123). (author)