Interatomic coulombic decay from clusters using an electron-ion multiple momentum coincidence technique

We have successfully observed interatomic Coulombic Decay (ICD) from clusters, which transfers an excited energy in an atomic ion to a neighboring species which subsequently releases its energy by emitting an electron. This ICD process is different from Auger decay which is intra-atomic transition. The ICD process is not negligible even without overlap of the wavefunction and the probability of the ICD process increases significantly with small overlap of the wavefunction. An electron-ion multiple momentum coincidence technique, which can record momenta of all the charged particles in each event, enables us to observe the ICD process. (author)