Nonadiabatic transitions in electrostatically trapped ammonia molecules
Atomic Physics
2009-09-10 v2 Chemical Physics
Abstract
Nonadiabatic transitions are known to be major loss channels for atoms in magnetic traps, but have thus far not been experimentally reported upon for trapped molecules. We have observed and quantified losses due to nonadiabatic transitions for three isotopologues of ammonia in electrostatic traps, by comparing the trapping times in traps with a zero and a non-zero electric field at the center. Nonadiabatic transitions are seen to dominate the overall loss rate even for samples at relatively high temperatures of 10-50 mK.
Cite
@article{arxiv.0811.4123,
title = {Nonadiabatic transitions in electrostatically trapped ammonia molecules},
author = {Moritz Kirste and Boris Saratakov and Melanie Schnell and Gerard Meijer},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0811.4123},
year = {2009}
}