Three-photon ionization transition rates are calculated for the alkali atoms (except Li) using quantum defect Coulomb functions to evaluate the well-known perturbation formula. Several corrections of previous work are mentioned. The often-used approximation of keeping only a small number of intermediate states is investigated. The predicted three-photon ionization rate (in cgs units) of the alkalis for the ruby photon energy of 1.78 eV is of the order of 10^-77 ×{} (photonflux)³. Detailed results are presented as dispersion curves of the transition rate for photon energies between the three-photon and two-photon thresholds.
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H. Barry Bebb (1967) studied this question.
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