Electronic Stopping Power in Gold: The Role of d Electrons and the H/He Anomaly

The electronic stopping power of H and He moving through gold is obtained to high accuracy using time-evolving density-functional theory, thereby bringing usual first principles accuracies into this kind of strongly coupled, continuum nonadiabatic processes in condensed matter. The two key unexplained features of what observed experimentally have been reproduced and understood: (i) The nonlinear behavior of stopping power versus velocity is a gradual crossover as excitations tail into the d-electron spectrum; and (ii) the low-velocity H/He anomaly (the relative stopping powers are contrary to established theory) is explained by the substantial involvement of the d electrons in the screening of the projectile even at the lowest velocities where the energy loss is generated by s-like electron-hole pair formation only.