Abstract
This article elaborates on a talk delivered by the first author at the First International Conference on the Physics of Phase Space (University of Maryland, 20–23 May 1986). It reviews briefly our still limited, but rapidly growing understanding of a dynamical process, the ionization of highly-excited hydrogen atoms by a microwave electric field. Classical dynamics explains surprisingly well many recent experimental results from Stony Brook, on which the article focusses. Some experimental results not well explained, however, appear to be essentially quantal in origin. These are just now beginning to be understood. New, detailed questions continue to arise as older questions are answered.
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References
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Koch, P.M., van Leeuwen, K.A.H., Rath, O., Richards, D., Jensen, R.V. (1987). Microwave ionization of highly excited hydrogen atoms: Experiment and theory. In: Kim, Y.S., Zachary, W.W. (eds) The Physics of Phase Space Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos Geometric Quantization, and Wigner Function. Lecture Notes in Physics, vol 278. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-17894-5_330
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-17894-5_330
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