Ultracold Chemical Reactions of a Single Rydberg Atom in a Dense Gas
Abstract
Within a dense environment (ρ ≈ 1014 atoms/cm3) at ultracold temperatures (T < 1 μK), a single atom excited to a Rydberg state acts as a reaction center for surrounding neutral atoms. At these temperatures, almost all neutral atoms within the Rydberg orbit are bound to the Rydberg core and interact with the Rydberg atom. We have studied the reaction rate and products for nS 87Rb Rydberg states, and we mainly observe a state change of the Rydberg electron to a high orbital angular momentum l, with the released energy being converted into kinetic energy of the Rydberg atom. Unexpectedly, the measurements show a threshold behavior at n ≈ 100 for the inelastic collision time leading to increased lifetimes of the Rydberg state independent of the densities investigated. Even at very high densities (ρ ≈ 4.8 x 1014 cm-3), the lifetime of a Rydberg atom exceeds 10 μs at n > 140 compared to 1 μs at n = 90. In addition, a second observed reaction mechanism, namely, Rb$$+\atop{2}$$ molecule formation, was studied. Both reaction products are equally probable for n = 40, but the fraction of Rb+2 created drops to below 10% for n ≥ 90.
- Authors:
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Purdue Univ., West Lafayette, IN (United States); Univ. of Stuttgart (Germany)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); German Research Foundation (DFG); European Research Council (ERC); Carl Zeiss Foundation (Germany)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1288990
- Alternate Identifier(s):
- OSTI ID: 1360091
- Grant/Contract Number:
- SC0010545; SFB/TRR21; PF 381/13-1; 267100; HO 4787/1-1
- Resource Type:
- Published Article
- Journal Name:
- Physical Review. X
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Name: Physical Review. X Journal Volume: 6 Journal Issue: 3; Journal ID: ISSN 2160-3308
- Publisher:
- American Physical Society
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS; Atomic and Molecular Physics; Chemical Physics
Citation Formats
Schlagmüller, Michael, Liebisch, Tara Cubel, Engel, Felix, Kleinbach, Kathrin S., Böttcher, Fabian, Hermann, Udo, Westphal, Karl M., Gaj, Anita, Löw, Robert, Hofferberth, Sebastian, Pfau, Tilman, Pérez-Ríos, Jesús, and Greene, Chris H. Ultracold Chemical Reactions of a Single Rydberg Atom in a Dense Gas. United States: N. p., 2016.
Web. doi:10.1103/PhysRevX.6.031020.
Schlagmüller, Michael, Liebisch, Tara Cubel, Engel, Felix, Kleinbach, Kathrin S., Böttcher, Fabian, Hermann, Udo, Westphal, Karl M., Gaj, Anita, Löw, Robert, Hofferberth, Sebastian, Pfau, Tilman, Pérez-Ríos, Jesús, & Greene, Chris H. Ultracold Chemical Reactions of a Single Rydberg Atom in a Dense Gas. United States. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.6.031020
Schlagmüller, Michael, Liebisch, Tara Cubel, Engel, Felix, Kleinbach, Kathrin S., Böttcher, Fabian, Hermann, Udo, Westphal, Karl M., Gaj, Anita, Löw, Robert, Hofferberth, Sebastian, Pfau, Tilman, Pérez-Ríos, Jesús, and Greene, Chris H. Wed .
"Ultracold Chemical Reactions of a Single Rydberg Atom in a Dense Gas". United States. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.6.031020.
@article{osti_1288990,
title = {Ultracold Chemical Reactions of a Single Rydberg Atom in a Dense Gas},
author = {Schlagmüller, Michael and Liebisch, Tara Cubel and Engel, Felix and Kleinbach, Kathrin S. and Böttcher, Fabian and Hermann, Udo and Westphal, Karl M. and Gaj, Anita and Löw, Robert and Hofferberth, Sebastian and Pfau, Tilman and Pérez-Ríos, Jesús and Greene, Chris H.},
abstractNote = {Within a dense environment (ρ ≈ 1014 atoms/cm3) at ultracold temperatures (T < 1 μK), a single atom excited to a Rydberg state acts as a reaction center for surrounding neutral atoms. At these temperatures, almost all neutral atoms within the Rydberg orbit are bound to the Rydberg core and interact with the Rydberg atom. We have studied the reaction rate and products for nS 87Rb Rydberg states, and we mainly observe a state change of the Rydberg electron to a high orbital angular momentum l, with the released energy being converted into kinetic energy of the Rydberg atom. Unexpectedly, the measurements show a threshold behavior at n ≈ 100 for the inelastic collision time leading to increased lifetimes of the Rydberg state independent of the densities investigated. Even at very high densities (ρ ≈ 4.8 x 1014 cm-3), the lifetime of a Rydberg atom exceeds 10 μs at n > 140 compared to 1 μs at n = 90. In addition, a second observed reaction mechanism, namely, Rb$+\atop{2}$ molecule formation, was studied. Both reaction products are equally probable for n = 40, but the fraction of Rb+2 created drops to below 10% for n ≥ 90.},
doi = {10.1103/PhysRevX.6.031020},
journal = {Physical Review. X},
number = 3,
volume = 6,
place = {United States},
year = {Wed Aug 10 00:00:00 EDT 2016},
month = {Wed Aug 10 00:00:00 EDT 2016}
}
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https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.6.031020
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