HYPERSPHERICAL HIERARCHY OF 3-ELECTRON RADIAL EXCITATIONS

We investigate hierarchical representation of three-electron radial ex citations, relying on the replacement of a sequence of ordered individ ual electron radial coordinates by a hierarchical sequence of hypersph erical radial variables. In the spirit of the hyperspherical method we argue that the latter variables allow adiabatic quasiseparability of the three-electron wave function. We examine this by approximately eva luating hyperspherical adiabatic potential curves and channel function s for the Li(s(3)) configuration. The hierarchical representation perm its one to display manifold aspects of the triply excited states with a pair of radial quantum numbers. [S1050-2947(97)02011-8].