Cross sections, stopping powers, and energy loss rates for rotational and phonon excitation processes in liquid water by electron impact

Kai, Takeshi   ; Yokoya, Akinari; Ukai, Masatoshi*; Watanabe, Ritsuko

Role of secondary electrons on DNA damage have not been understood sufficiently because there still exists a lack of cross section of rotational and phonon excitation in the liquid phase for precise simulation of the electron behavior. We calculated cross sections, stopping powers, and energy loss rates for the excitations in liquid water. The values for rotation are less by three orders of magnitude than those in the gas phase, while the values for phonon are close to those reported for amorphous ice. Thermalization process has so far been estimated from an assumption that the energy loss rates do not depend strongly on the energy below 1 eV. However, we found that the energy loss rates depend significantly on the energy. This fact indicates that the thermalization time will be longer than the previously estimated time, and we predict that thermalization process strongly involve in subsequent hydrated and chemical processes. The data set provide here is expected to useful to make the role of the secondary electrons on DNA damage much clear.