https://doi.org/10.1007/s100530170165
Cold rubidium molecule formation through photoassociation: A spectroscopic study of the 0g- long-range state of 87Rb2
1
Istituto di Fisica Atomica e Molecolare del C.N.R., via Alfieri 1, 56010 Ghezzano, Pisa, Italy
2
Unità INFM, Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Pisa, piazza Torricelli 2, 56126 Pisa, Italy
3
Laboratoire Aimé Cotton, Université Paris-Sud, 91405 Orsay Cedex, France
4
Istituto di Elettronica Quantistica del C.N.R., via Panciatichi 56, 50127 Firenze, Italy
Corresponding author: a carlo@ifam.pi.cnr.it
Received:
18
January
2001
Revised:
10
April
2001
Published online: 15 August 2001
We report the detailed analysis of translationally cold
rubidium molecule formation through photoassociation. Cold molecules
are formed after spontaneous decay of photoexcited molecules from a
laser cooled atomic sample, and are detected by selective mass
spectroscopy after two-photon ionization into Rb ions. A
spectroscopic study of the
pure long-range
state of 87Rb2 is performed by detecting the ion yield as a
function of the photoassociation laser frequency; the spectral data
are theoretically analyzed within the semiclassical RKR approach.
Molecular ionization is resonantly enhanced through either the
or the
intermediate molecular
states. Some vibrational levels of the latter electronic state are
observed and assigned here for the first time. Finally, cold
molecules formation rates are calculated and compared to the
experimentally measured ones, and the vibrational distribution of the
formed molecules in the
ground triplet state is
discussed.
PACS: 32.80.Pj – Optical cooling of atoms; trapping / 34.50.Rk – Laser-modified scattering and reactions
© EDP Sciences, Società Italiana di Fisica, Springer-Verlag, 2001