XUV fluorescence as a probe of interatomic coulombic decay of resonantly excited He nanodroplets
Superfluid He nanodroplets resonantly excited by extreme ultraviolet (XUV) pulses can relax via interatomic coulombic decay (ICD), generally considered an ultrafast process. Here, we introduce a novel approach to probe the dynamics of ICD in He nanodroplets over timescales ranging from femtoseconds to nanoseconds. Our method relies on detecting XUV fluorescence emitted from the nanodroplets as they are driven into a nanoplasma by subsequent intense infrared pulses. Nanoplasma ignition is facilitated by tunnel ionization of XUV-excited He[Formula: see text] atoms attached to the droplets; it thus serves as a sensitive probe of their relaxation dynamics. The observed nanosecond-scale decay is attributed to ICD between pairs of He[Formula: see text] atoms undergoing roaming motion on the droplet surface, as supported by quantum-mechanical and classical model calculations.
Authors
- Keshav Sishodia (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0005-7994-3005)
- M. Mudrich (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4959-5220)
- M. Staněk (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0002-1432-1721)
- J. Nejdl
- I Földeş (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1319-058X)
- Ltaief Ben Ltaief (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6904-4648)
- Andreas H. Roos (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4171-1493)
- Niklas Scheel
- Ernesto García‐Alfonso (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6936-4230)
- S. Krishnan (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6533-2431)
- Jakob Andreasson (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3202-2330)
- O. Hort
- Nadine Halberstadt (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2514-2350)
- Andreas Heidenreich (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2650-4464)
- Maria Krikunova (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6152-1825)
- Eva Klimešová (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9569-7511)
- Martin Albrecht (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0103-5614)
- Lucie Jurkovičová
Institutions
- University of Kassel (DE)
- Ikerbasque (ES)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Aarhus University (DK)
- Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IN)
- Technical University of Applied Sciences Wildau (DE)
- Extreme Light Infrastructure Beamlines (CZ)
- HUN-REN Wigner Research Centre for Physics (HU)
- Laboratoire Collisions Agrégats Réactivité (FR)
- Czech Technical University in Prague (CZ)
- Donostia International Physics Center (ES)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Scientific Reports
- Published
- 2026-01-09
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-34677-x
- Primary Topic
- Quantum, superfluid, helium dynamics
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- Villum Fonden
- Department of Science and Technology, Ministry of Science and Technology, India
- Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst
- Indo-French Centre for the Promotion of Advanced Research
- Eusko Jaurlaritza
- Indian Institute of Technology Madras
- Novo Nordisk
- Novo Nordisk Fonden
- Scheme for Promotion of Academic and Research Collaboration