Electron spectroscopy with fast heavy ions

Since about 1970 the spectroscopy of Auger-electrons and characteristic x-rays following energetic ion-atom collisions has received a great deal of attention. An increasing number of accelerators, capable of providing a large number of projectile ion species over a wide range of projectile energies, became available for studying ion-atom collision phenomena. Many charged particles from protons up to heavy ions like uranium can be accelerated to energies ranging over six orders of magnitude. This allows us to study systematically a great variety of effects accompanied by dynamic excitation processes of the atomic shells in either the projectile- or target-atoms. The studies yield fundamental information regarding the excitation mechanism (e.g., Coulomb and quasi-molecular excitation) and allow sensitive tests of atomic structure theories. This information in turn is valuable to other fields in physics like plasma-, astro-, or solid-state (surface) physics. It is a characteristic feature of fast heavy-ion accelerators that they can produce highly stripped ion species which have in turn the capability to highly ionize neutral target atoms or molecules in a single collision. The ionization process, mainly due to the strong electrical fields that are involved, allows us to study few-electron atoms with high atomic numbers Z. High resolution spectroscopy performed with these atoms allows a particularly good test of relativistic and QED effects. The probability of producing these few electron systems is determined by the charge state and the velocity of the projectile ions. In this contribution the possibilities of using electron spectroscopy as a tool to investigate fast ion-atom collisions is discussed and demonstrated with a few examples. 30 references