https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/e2015-60229-x
Regular Article
Scaled-energy spectroscopy for alkali-earth rydberg atom in external fields
1 State Key Laboratory of Magnetic
Resonance and Atomic and Molecular Physics, Wuhan Institute of Physics and
Mathematics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan
430071, P.R.
China
2 University of Chinese Academy of
Sciences, Beijing
100049, P.R.
China
a
e-mail: liuhongping@wipm.ac.cn
Received:
13
April
2015
Received in final form:
1
July
2015
Published online:
2
February
2016
The alkali-earth Rydberg atom in external fields is theoretically investigated by scaled-energy spectroscopy incorporating energy-dependent quantum defects. Closed-orbit theory is successful in reproducing the experimental observations for hydrogen and hydrogen-like alkali atoms in external fields. However, for the alkali-earth atoms such as barium, even the highly excited Rydberg electron can not be taken as isolated from the spectator valence electron(s) for the electron correlations. Closed-orbit theory cannot give a satisfactory explanation since the electron correlations are angular momentum and energy-dependent. In this paper, we perform a quantum calculation incorporating implicitly the quantum defects varying with energy where the electron correlation information is subsumed. The results recover the experimental observations for barium in magnetic or electric fields very well.
Key words: Atomic Physics
© EDP Sciences, Società Italiana di Fisica, Springer-Verlag 2016