Mobility of carbon ions and C⁺(⁴P) in helium computed from quantum-mechanical transport cross sections

Abstract

On the light of a previous work and its recommendations by Matoba et al. [J. Phys. B 41, 145205 (2008)], this paper proposes to look at the mobility of ground and metastable-excited states of C⁺ ions moving into a helium buffer gas. The calculations, based on the three-temperature theory for solving the Boltzmann kinetic equation, are accomplished with quantum-mechanical transport cross sections at the low temperatures 4.3 and 77 K. The obtained mobility results are contrasted with the available theoretical data and experimental measurements, which show acceptable agreements.

Keywords:

• potential-energy curve
• transport cross section
• three-temperature theory
• mobility

PACS numbers:

• 34.20.Cf
• 51.10.+y
• 51.20.+d
• 72.20.Fr

Acknowledgements

Special thanks are sent, mainly from one of the authors, Moncef Bouledroua, to Dr Larry A. Viehland, from Chatham University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA, for providing his Fortran codes gramchar.f and gc.f. The latter program has been used in the main parts of the present calculations.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.