Electron dynamics of molecular double ionization by circularly polarized laser pulses.

Using the classical ensemble method, we have investigated double ionization (DI) of diatomic molecules driven by circularly polarized laser pulses with different internuclear distances (R). The results show that the DI mechanism changes from sequential double ionization (SDI) to nonsequential double ionization (NSDI) as the internuclear distance increases. In SDI range, the structure of the electron momentum distribution changes seriously as R increases, which indicates the sensitive dependence of the release times of the two electrons on R. For NSDI, because of the circular polarization, the ionization of the second electron is not through the well-known recollision process but through a process where the first electron ionizes over the inner potential barrier of the molecule, moves directly towards the other nucleus, and kicks out the second electron.