NONLOCAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE RECOMBINATION ENERGY IN SPIN-POLARIZED ATOMIC-HYDROGEN

One of the important but little studied characteristics of spin-polarized hydrogen is the enormous energy release due to surface recombination into molecular H-2. We have studied the relaxation and distribution of this energy throughout a sample. A phenomenological parameter, F, defined as the fraction of total recombination energy released locally at the point of recombination has been measured. Our upper bound of F < 0.04 demonstrates that very little energy is directly coupled to the surface at this point.