Long-range interaction and the dynamics of nonadiabatic transitions in collisions of the I2(E) molecule with inert gas atoms

A special form of perturbation theory based on intermolecular interaction was used to analyze the contributions to the interaction energy between a homonuclear diatomic molecule with dipole-coupled electronic states n and n′ and a neutral particle A. At large distances, the energy of the system in both states n and n′ is determined by the induction contribution similar to the induction interaction of particle A and a polar molecule. The presence of a constant electric moment of particle A gives an electrostatic contribution to the matrix element of the nonadiabatic coupling of the states n and n′. The equations obtained were specialized to describe the interaction of the iodine molecule excited to ion-pair states with an inert gas atom and used as corrections to the potential energy surfaces of this system constructed within the diatomics-in-molecule approximation. The dynamics of transitions between the ion-pair states of the I₂ molecule induced by collisions with the Ar and He atoms was calculated. The results demonstrate the importance of correctly including long-range interaction.