Physics of Highly Excited Atoms and Ions

The status of research in the Physics of Highly Excited Atoms and Ions is covered in this monograph. It includes today's approaches and methods for describing isolated Rydberg atoms and ions, radiative transitions between highly excited states, and photoionization and photorecombination processes. The authors present a number of efficient methods for the calculations in the theory of collisions of highly excited atoms and ions with neutral and charged particles and of spectral-line broadening of Rydberg atomic series in gases, low- and high-temperature plasmas, and astrophysics. Particular attention is paid to a comparison of the theoretical results with available experimental data.
TOC: Introduction.- Classical and Quantum Description of Rydberg Atom.- Radiative Transitions and Form Factors.- Basic Approaches to Collisions Involving Highly Excited Atoms and Ions.- Collisions of Rydberg Atom with Neutral Particles.- Elementary Processes Involving Rydberg Atoms and Neutral Particles.- Effects of Ion Core in Rydberg Atom-Neutral Collisions.- Inelastic Transitions Induced by Collisions of Rydberg Atom.- Spectral-Line Broadening and Shift.