Frankfurt 2006 – scientific programme
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A: Atomphysik
A 9: Poster I: Ultrakalte Atome und BEC
A 9.3: Poster
Tuesday, March 14, 2006, 16:30–18:30, Labsaal
Manipulating and trapping Rydberg atoms in magnetic quadrupole fields — •Igor Lesanovsky1 and Peter Schmelcher1,2 — 1Physikalisches Institut, Universität Heidelberg, Philosophenweg 12, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany — 2Theoretische Chemie, Universität Heidelberg, INF 229, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany
We discuss the dynamics of Rydberg atoms being exposed to a magnetic quadrupole field. In contrast to ground state atoms, excited (Rydberg) atoms cannot be considered to be neutral point-like particles which couple only through their magnetic moment to the external field. Instead one has to account for the coupling of the charge and of the magnetic moments of the atomic constituents to the external field [1]. We present a Hamiltonian describing the coupled electronic and center of mass dynamics of alkali atoms in an arbitrarily shaped linear magnetic field configuration. For atoms in Rydberg configuration the underlying Schrödinger equation is solved by employing an adiabatic approach. After having obtained the adiabatic energy surfaces we provide an analysis of the adiabatic center of mass quantum states. We discuss under which circumstances trapped center of mass states are achievable and analyze their lifetimes with respect to radiative decay.
[1] Igor Lesanovsky, Jörg Schmiedmayer, and Peter Schmelcher, J.Phys. B 38 S151 (2005)
[2] Igor Lesanovsky and Peter Schmelcher, Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 053001 (2005)
[3] Igor Lesanovsky and Peter Schmelcher, Phys. Rev. A 72, 053410 (2005)