Rare-earth ions in the alkali halides. III. Electron-lattice coupling and the details of the vibronic spectra

Abstract

Electron-lattice interaction is discussed for the case of rare-earth ions in the alkali halides. A selection rule is derived to show that for the present defect electronic transitions can be coupled only to vibrational modes of A1 symmetry. Under the assumption of electrostatic coupling between the electron and the lattice vibrations, a coupling function is derived which is proportional to the projection of the field of the electron under-going a transition on to the eigenvectors of the vibrations. It is further shown that this coupling function can be determined from the details of the structural form of the vibronic spectra. A number of other features of the vibronic spectra are accounted for through the properties of Franck-Condon integrals. © 1965 The American Physical Society.