FERMION MOLECULAR-DYNAMICS IN THE CAPTURE OF MUONS BY HYDROGEN-ATOMS

The fermion-molecular-dynamics (FMD) method is applied to negative-muo n (mu(-)) capture by the hydrogen atom. It is found that the FMD resul ts are similar to those of the classical-trajectory Monte Carlo (CTMC) method, whose validity was confirmed previously by the most accurate existing method, classical-quantal coupling (CQC). Thus FMD is validat ed as a quasiclassical method for mu(-) capture and will be applicable to multi-electron atomic and molecular targets, for which the CTMC ap proach is not suitable. Actually the FMD results agree slightly better with the CQC results and suggest an interpretation of the very low-en ergy and adiabatic-ionization-threshold regions where the quantal (CQC ) cross sections differ most from the classical (CTMC) results.