Rigorous Negative Ion Binding Energies in Low-Energy Electron Elastic Collisions with Heavy Multi-Electron Atoms and Fullerene Molecules: Validation of Electron Affinities

Abstract

Dramatically sharp resonances manifesting stable negative ion formation characterize Regge pole-calculated low-energy electron elastic total cross sections (TCSs) of heavy multi-electron systems. The novelty of the Regge pole analysis is in the extraction of rigorous and unambiguous negative ion binding energies (BEs), corresponding to the measured electron affinities (EAs) of the investigated multi-electron systems. The measured EAs have engendered the crucial question: is the EA of multi-electron atoms and fullerene molecules identified with the BE of the attached electron in the ground, metastable or excited state of the formed negative ion during a collision? Inconsistencies in the meaning of the measured EAs are elucidated and new EA values for Bk, Cf, Fm, and Lr are presented.

Keywords

• Regge poles
• generalized bound states
• multi-electron atoms
• elastic cross sections
• anionic binding energies
• electron affinities