Measurements of high energy loss rates of fast highly charged U ions channeled in thin silicon crystals

The results of two channeling experiments show that highly charged heavy ions at moderate velocities ($v\ensuremath{\ll}{\mathit{Zv}}_{0}$) may lose more energy in the traversal of a thin crystal when they are injected along a major crystallographic direction than when they traverse the crystal in random conditions. This is due to the fact that the large reduction of electron capture probabilities allows them to keep their high electronic charge throughout the crystal, which is not the case for projectiles traveling in random conditions. Although channeled projectiles experience reduced electron densities, their energy loss rate, that is, at first order, proportional to the square of the ions charge, is then strongly enhanced. This feature could be used as a step for decelerating highly charged ions from the high energies that are needed to produce them, and also to improve our understanding of the slowing down of very highly charged projectiles at low velocities, for which the current perturbative models are not well suited.