Photoionization and detection of ultracold Cs2 molecules through diffuse bands
C. M. Dion1, O. Dulieu1, D. Comparat1, W. de Souza Melo1, N. Vanhaecke1, P. Pillet1, R. Beuc2, S. Milosevic2, and G. Pichler1,2
1Laboratoire Aimé Cotton du CNRS, Bâtiment 505,
Campus d'Orsay, 91405 Orsay, France
2Istitute of Physics, P.O. Box 304, HR-10001 Zagreb, Croatia
We present the results of absorption measurements in a cesium vapor around 630 K, together with photoionization spectra through a resonance-enhanced two-photon absorption of ultracold cesium dimers created after photoassociation of ultracold cesium atoms. The maximum efficiency of the umtracold molecule ionization is found for wavelengths where absorption at thermal energies is the strongest, in agreement with our theoretical simulations of both processes, involving the so-called Cs2 diffuse bands. This result will be helpful for further optimization of such a direct way of detection of ultracold molecules.
Published in The European Physical Journal D 18, 365 (2002).
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