Atomic structure via highly charged ions and their exact quantum states

For highly charged ions with 3 to 10 electrons, we derive explicit, closed form quantum states which become exact in the high charge limit. When combined with suitably renormalized experimental data across iso-electronic sequences, these quantum states provide a novel and widely applicable route to predicting electronic configurations and term values for neutral atom energy levels. Moreover, our findings allow to predict missing levels, suggest that certain current term assignments for fiveelectron ions are incorrect, and provide insight into the rare failure of Hund’s rules in excited states.