Creating and probing electronic wave packets using half-cycle pulses

Journal Article · Wed May 01 00:00:00 EDT 1996 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.76.3927· OSTI ID:285717

Jones, R R ^[1]

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1. Physics Department, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia 22901 (United States)

Ultrashort, nearly unipolar electric field pulses are used to produce novel dynamic states in Rydberg atoms. A single 500 fsec field pulse redistributes essentially all of the population from a single stationary Rydberg state to hundreds of different final states. The dynamic evolution of the nonstationary wave packet is monitored using a second, time-delayed pulse. The time-dependent momentum-space probability distribution of the wave packet can be retrieved experimentally using a classical impulse approximation. {copyright} {ital 1996 The American Physical Society.}

• OSTI ID: 285717
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Vol. 76, Issue 21; Other Information: PBD: May 1996
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

66 PHYSICS
ATOMS
RYDBERG STATES
WAVE PACKETS
ELECTRIC FIELDS
POPULATIONS
TIME DELAY
IMPULSE APPROXIMATION
PULSES
TIME DEPENDENCE