STOPPING POWER OF HEAVY-ION BEAMS IN STRONGLY COUPLED PLASMAS

The stopping power of heavy-ion beams in strongly coupled target plasmas is investigated by performing molecular dynamics (MD) computer simulations. For a comparison of our results we examine effects of ion-ion correlations on the stopping power of a rigid ion lattice moving through a target plasma within dielectric response theory. While the dielectric description show enhanced stopping power due to multi-ion interferences, we do not observe this in the MD simulations. We find that these interferences are destroyed by collisions and the enhancement of stopping power disappears for strong coupling. This confirms the importance of particle collisions in this regime.