Attosecond streaking in the low-energy region as a probe of rescattering

Phys Rev Lett. 2011 Oct 28;107(18):183001. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.107.183001. Epub 2011 Oct 26.

Abstract

The dynamics of low-energy photoelectrons (PEs) ionized by a single attosecond pulse in the presence of an intense infrared (IR) laser field is investigated. Whereas attosecond streaking usually involves momentum shifts of high-energy PEs, when PEs have low initial kinetic energies, the IR field can control the continuum-electron dynamics by inducing PE scattering from the residual ion. A semiclassical model is used to show that particular PE trajectories in the continuum involving electron-ion scattering explain the interference patterns exhibited in the low-energy PE spectrum. We confirm the effects of the trajectories by means of a full quantum simulation.