Long-range interaction between polar Rydberg atoms
- 6 January 2005
- journal article
- Published by IOP Publishing in Journal of Physics B: Atomic, Molecular and Optical Physics
- Vol. 38 (2), S279-S293
- https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-4075/38/2/020
Abstract
The most attractive and the most repulsive potential-energy curves for interaction between two Rydberg atoms in a broad superposition of internal angular momentum states are studied. The extreme Stark states have the largest dipole moments and provide the dominant contribution to the interaction which is then expressed as a long-range expansion involving the permanent multipole moments Qj of each polar atom. Analytical expressions are obtained for all Qj associated with principal quantum number n of H(n) and permit the long- range expansion for the H(n)-H(n� ) first-order interaction to be explicitly expressed analytically in terms of n, nand internuclear distance R. Possible quasi-molecular formation is investigated. Direct calculations show that the H(n = 2)-H(n� = 2) interaction is capable of supporting 47 bound vibrational levels. As n increases, the long-range interaction becomes increasingly attractive so that molecular formation at large internuclear distances is expected to be scarcely possible for these extreme Stark levels. (Some figures in this article are in colour only in the electronic version)Keywords
This publication has 18 references indexed in Scilit:
- Giant Helium Dimers Produced by Photoassociation of Ultracold Metastable AtomsPhysical Review Letters, 2003
- Purely-long-range bound states ofHe(2s3S)+He(2p3P)Physical Review A, 2003
- Rydberg Cold Collisions Dominated by Ultralong Range PotentialPhysical Review Letters, 2003
- Linking Ultracold Polar MoleculesPhysical Review Letters, 2003
- Macrodimers: Ultralong Range Rydberg MoleculesPhysical Review Letters, 2002
- Long-range interactions between twoexcited hydrogen atomsPhysical Review A, 2002
- Dipole Blockade and Quantum Information Processing in Mesoscopic Atomic EnsemblesPhysical Review Letters, 2001
- Creation of Polar and Nonpolar Ultra-Long-Range Rydberg MoleculesPhysical Review Letters, 2000
- Photoassociation of Ultracold Atoms: A New Spectroscopic TechniqueJournal of Molecular Spectroscopy, 1999
- Pure Long-Range MoleculesPhysical Review Letters, 1978