Asymmetry and interference effects in plasmon excitation by external charged particles for incoming and outgoing trajectories

Abstract

We use both quantum mechanical and semiclassical dielectric formulations to study how an external charged particle, moving in the vicinity or traversing a solid surface, couples with the bulk and surface excitations. We pay special attention to the differences and similarities between incoming and outgoing trajectories, finding some novel oscillatory structures that can be ascribed to interference effects between direct and reflected plasmon excitations.