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Dr. Tom Kirchner

Dr. Tom Kirchner

Professor of Physics

Department of Physics and Astronomy, Faculty of Science

Vita (last update: October 2019)

Research Specialization

My research is concerned with the question of how atomic and molecular few-body systems respond to perturbations exerted on them by impinging particles and external fields. Such collision or laser field induced quantum dynamics have implications for a variety of topics and applications ranging from plasma diagnostics to radiation biology. What is more, they constitute a problem of fundamental importance: How do the building blocks of matter interact and evolve in space and time? The better this question is answered the more is learned about a further issue that receives considerable attention: Can few-body quantum dynamics be manipulated purposefully and controlled actively? I have participated in a number of projects and activities to shed light on these issues by theoretical analysis and computations. The theoretical approaches used include density functional theory to deal with the many-electron problem, and both nonperturbative and perturbative quantum methods to describe the dynamics of the systems.

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