Eur. Phys. J. D 41, 95-102 (2007)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2006-00192-1

Classical dynamics of polar diatomic molecules in external fields

Area de Física Aplicada, Universidad de La Rioja, 26006 Logroño, Spain

Corresponding author: ^a josepablo.salas@dq.unirioja.es

Received: 26 April 2006
Revised: 20 June 2006
Published online: 18 August 2006

Abstract

In this paper, we present the study of the global classical dynamics of a rigid diatomic molecule in the presence of combined electrostatic and nonresonant polarized laser fields. In particular, we focus on the collinear field case, which is an integrable system because the z-component P_φ of the angular momentum is conserved. The study involves the complete analysis of the stability of the equilibrium points, their bifurcations and the evolution of the phase flow as a function of the field strengths and P_φ. Finally, the influence of the bifurcations on the orientation of the quantum states is studied.