Formation of antihydrogen atoms in an ultra-cold positron-antiproton plasma
Abstract
We discuss the formation of antihydrogen atoms (
H
¯
) in an ultra-cold positron-antiproton plasma. For positron densities $n_p\agt 10^8$ cm
−3
the characteristic formation time of stable
H
¯
is determined by collisional relaxation of highly excited atoms produced in the process of 3-body Thompson recombination. Relying on the mechanisms of ``replacement collisions'' and ``transverse collisional drift'' we find a bottleneck in the relaxation kinetics and analyze the physical consequences of this phenomenon.