Photoassociation of a cold-atom-molecule pair: Long-range quadrupole-quadrupole interactions

Journal Article · Fri Oct 15 00:00:00 EDT 2010 · Physical Review. A

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVA.82.042711· OSTI ID:21450779

Lepers, M; Dulieu, O ^[1]; Kokoouline, V ^[1]

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1. Laboratoire Aime Cotton, CNRS, UPR3321, Batiment 505, Universite Paris-Sud, F-91405 Orsay Cedex (France)

The general formalism of the multipolar expansion of electrostatic interactions is applied to the calculation of the potential energy between an excited atom (without fine structure) and a ground-state diatomic molecule at large mutual separations. Both partners exhibit a permanent quadrupole moment so that their mutual long-range interaction is dominated by a quadrupole-quadrupole term, which is attractive enough to bind trimers. Numerical results are given for an excited Cs(6{sup 2}P) atom and a ground-state Cs{sub 2} molecule. The prospects for achieving photoassociation of a cold-atom-dimer pair are thus discussed and found promising. The formalism can be generalized to the long-range interaction between molecules to investigate the formation of cold tetramers.

• OSTI ID: 21450779
• Journal Information: Physical Review. A, Vol. 82, Issue 4; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.82.042711; (c) 2010 The American Physical Society; ISSN 1050-2947
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS
ATOMS
CESIUM
DIMERS
EXCITED STATES
FINE STRUCTURE
GROUND STATES
INTERACTION RANGE
INTERACTIONS
MOLECULES
P STATES
PHOTON-ATOM COLLISIONS
PHOTON-MOLECULE COLLISIONS
POTENTIAL ENERGY
QUADRUPOLE MOMENTS
ALKALI METALS
ATOM COLLISIONS
COLLISIONS
DISTANCE
ELEMENTS
ENERGY
ENERGY LEVELS
METALS
MOLECULE COLLISIONS
PHOTON COLLISIONS