Vortices in Atomic Wave Functions

Vortices in atomic wave functions are shown to have observable consequences. It is shown that time-dependent electron wave functions in coordinate space go over to electron emission amplitudes in the limit that time becomes infinite. This relation between wave functions and emission amplitudes is called the imaging theorem. According to this theorem vortices in wave functions at small times when particles interact in a complex way appear as vortices in electron momentum distributions where they produce observable features. Conversely, some observable structures may be interpreted in terms of vortices no matter how they are seen or computed. We verify that previously unexplained features in (e,2e) triply differential cross sections can be interpreted in terms of vortices.