Editing Coulomb explosion (section)

==Coulomb explosion imaging==

Molecules are held together by a balance of charge between negative electrons and positive nuclei. When multiple electrons are expelled, either by laser irradiation or bombardment using highly charged ions, the remaining, mutually repulsive, nuclei fly apart in a Coulomb explosion. The structure of simple gas phase molecules can be determined by imaging which tracks the fragment trajectories.<ref>{{cite journal 
| last = Légaré | first = F.|display-authors=etal
|title=Laser Coulomb-explosion imaging of small molecules
|journal = Physical Review A |volume = 71 |page = 013415| year = 2005| issue = 1|doi = 10.1103/PhysRevA.71.013415| bibcode = 2005PhRvA..71a3415L| s2cid = 39373145| url = https://nrc-publications.canada.ca/eng/view/accepted/?id=7320bcc5-83fb-4b3e-ae16-50976d0f02a9}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |author1=B. Siegmann 
|author2=U. Werner |author3=H. O. Lutz |author4=R. Mann 
| title = Complete Coulomb fragmentation of CO<sub>2</sub> in collisions with 5.9 MeV u<sup>−1</sup> Xe<sup>18+</sup> and Xe<sup>43+</sup>| journal = J Phys B
| volume = 35 |issue = 17 
| page= 3755 | year = 2002| doi = 10.1088/0953-4075/35/17/311
|bibcode=2002JPhB...35.3755S|s2cid=250782825 }}</ref> As of 2022 the method can work with up to 11-atom molecules.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Boll |first1=Rebecca |last2=Schäfer |first2=Julia M. |last3=Richard |first3=Benoît |last4=Fehre |first4=Kilian |last5=Kastirke |first5=Gregor |last6=Jurek |first6=Zoltan |last7=Schöffler |first7=Markus S. |last8=Abdullah |first8=Malik M. |last9=Anders |first9=Nils |last10=Baumann |first10=Thomas M. |last11=Eckart |first11=Sebastian |date=2022-02-21 |title=X-ray multiphoton-induced Coulomb explosion images complex single molecules |journal=Nature Physics |volume=18 |issue=4 |pages=423–428 |language=en |doi=10.1038/s41567-022-01507-0 |s2cid=247047286 |issn=1745-2473|doi-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |date=2022-03-25 |title=Coulomb-explosion imaging tackles an 11-atom molecule |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/pt.6.1.20220325a |journal=Physics Today |volume=2022 |issue=1 |pages=0325a |doi=10.1063/pt.6.1.20220325a |bibcode=2022PhT..2022a.325. |s2cid=247826394 |issn=1945-0699 |last1=Miller |first1=Johanna L. |url-access=subscription }}</ref>