P.A. Závodszky, H. Aliabadi, P. Richard, M.W. Gealy^*, C.P. Bhalla
Kansas State University, J.R. Macdonald Laboratory, Manhattan, KS 66506

The recent interest in the production of photon-induced triply excited hollow lithium atoms generated considerable excitement as evidenced by a number of publications. In the present study we report the observation of similar triply excited Li-like ionic states produced in ion-molecule collisions. Electrons emitted in the forward direction in the collision of a 21 MeV F⁷⁺ ion beam with molecular hydrogen were measured with a tandem parallel plate spectrometer. In addition to the well known structure of the binary encounter peak due to the nonresonant elastic scattering of the target electrons by the projectile nucleus, we observed a series of Auger lines due to the population and decay of (2s nl n'l') (n, n>=2) triply excited states of the projectile. These projectile states are produced by the excitation of a 1s orbital electron to an nl orbital and capture of one quasi-free target electron to an n'l' orbital of the (1s2s) ³S state, which is a metastable component of the F⁷⁺ beam. A comparison of our experimental results with theory will be presented.