Study of electron polarization and correlation effects in resonant and background electron scattering off CF3Cl

We report on ab initio calculations for electron-CF3Cl scattering based on the R-matrix approach. Eigenphases and cross-sections are presented for collision energies up to 15 eV in static exchange and static exchange plus polarization (SEP) approximation. The SEP results for integral cross-sections agree satisfactorily with experimental total cross-sections. Moreover, the partial cross-sections confirm the symmetry assignment of the lowest three resonances as has been found in experiments carried out by Mann and Linder. Electron polarization and correlation effects are studied separately for resonant and background scattering. For this separation, the Feshbach projection operator technique formulated within the R-matrix framework is applied. We found that the description of resonant scattering is considerably affected by configuration interaction. The background scattering appears to be appropriately described on the SEP level. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.