Multi-electron giant dipole resonances of atoms in crossed electric and magnetic fields are investigated. Stationary configurations corresponding to a highly symmetric arrangement of the electrons on a decentered circle are derived, and a normal-mode stability analysis is performed. A classification of the various modes, which are dominated either by the magnetic or Coulomb interactions, is provided. A six-dimensional wave-packet dynamical study, based on the MCTDH approach, is accomplished for the two-electron resonances, yielding in particular lifetimes of more than 0.1 $μ$s for strong electric fields.
Multi-electron giant dipole resonances of atoms in crossed electric and magnetic fields are investigated. Stationary configurations corresponding to a highly symmetric arrangement of the electrons on a decentered circle are derived, and a normal-mode and stability analysis are performed. A classification of the various modes, which are dominated by the magnetic field or the Coulomb interactions, is provided. Based on the MCTDH approach, we carry out a six-dimensional wave-packet dynamical study for the two-electron resonances, yielding in particular lifetimes of more than 0.1 $μ$s for strong e…
We explore the classical dynamics of atoms in an optical dipole trap formed by two identical Gaussian beams propagating in perpendicular directions. The phase space is a mixture of regular and chaotic orbits, the later becoming dominant as the energy of the atoms increases. The trapping capabilities of these perpendicular Gaussian beams are investigated by considering an atomic ensemble in free motion. After a sudden turn on of the dipole trap, a certain fraction of atoms in the ensemble remains trapped. The majority of these trapped atoms has energies larger than the escape channels, which ca…
We show the existence of ultra-long-range giant dipole molecules formed by a neutral alkali ground state atom that is bound to the decentered electronic wave function of a giant dipole atom. The adiabatic potential surfaces emerging from the interaction of the ground state atom with the giant dipole electron posses a rich topology depending on the degree of electronic excitation. Binding energies and the vibrational motion in the energetically lowest surfaces are analyzed by means of perturbation theory and exact diagonalization techniques. The resulting molecules are truly giant with internuc…
We report an apparatus and method capable of producing Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) of ~1x10^6 87Rb atoms, and ultimately designed for sympathetic cooling of 133Cs and the creation of ultracold RbCs molecules. The method combines several elements: i) the large recapture of a magnetic quadrupole trap from a magneto-optical trap, ii) efficient forced RF evaporation in such a magnetic trap, iii) the gain in phase-space density obtained when loading the magnetically trapped atoms into a far red-detuned optical dipole trap and iv) efficient evaporation to BEC within the dipole trap. We demonstr…
We present the experimental realization of a compressible blue detuned crossed dipole trap for cold atoms allowing for fast dynamical compression (~ 5 - 10 ms) of 5x10^7 Rubidium atoms up to densities of ~ 10^13 cm^-3. The dipole trap consists of two intersecting tubes of blue-detuned laser light. These tubes are formed using a single, rapidly rotating laser beam which, for sufficiently fast rotation frequencies, can be accurately described by a quasi-static potential. The atomic cloud is compressed by dynamically reducing the trap volume leading to densities close to the Ioffe-Reggel criterio…
We report on an efficient production scheme for a large quantum degenerate sample of fermionic lithium. The approach is based on our previous work on narrow-line $ 2S_{1/2}\rightarrow 3P_{3/2} $ laser cooling resulting in a high phase-space density of up to $3\times10^{-4}$. This allows utilizing a large volume crossed optical dipole trap with a total power of $45\,\textrm{W}$, leading to high loading efficiency and $8\times10^6$ trapped atoms. The same optical trapping configuration is used for rapid adiabatic transport over a distance of $25\,\textrm{cm}$ in $0.9\,\textrm{s}$, and subsequent…
In this article we extend the theory of ultra-long-range giant dipole molecules, formed by an atom in a giant dipole state and a ground-state alkali atom, by angular-momentum couplings known from recent works on Rydberg molecules. In addition to $s$-wave scattering, the next higher order of $p$-wave scattering in the Fermi-pseudopotential describing the binding mechanism is considered. Furthermore, the singlet and triplet channels of the scattering interaction as well as angular-momentum couplings such as hyperfine interaction and Zeeman interactions are included. Within the framework of Born-…
In this work we present the eigenspectra of a novel species of Wannier excitons when exposed to crossed electric and magnetic fields. In particular, we compute the eigenenergies of giant-dipole excitons in $\textrm{Cu}_2\textrm{O}$ in crossed fields. In our theoretical approach, we calculate the excitonic spectra within both an approximate as well as a numerically exact approach for arbitrary field configurations. We verify that stable bound excitonic giant-dipole states are only possible in the strong magnetic field limit, as this is the only regime providing sufficiently deep potential wells…
We predict the existence of a class of ultracold giant molecules formed from trapped ultracold Rydberg atoms and polar molecules. The interaction which leads to the formation of such molecules is the anisotropic charge-dipole interaction ($a/R^2$). We show that prominent candidate molecules such as KRb and deuterated hydroxyl (OD) should bind to Rydberg rubidium atoms, with energies $E_b\simeq 5-25$ GHz at distances $R\simeq 0.1-1 \ μ$m. These molecules form in double wells, mimicking chiral molecules, with each well containing a particular dipole orientation. We prepare a set of correlated dr…
In this work we perform a Green's function analysis of giant-dipole systems. First we derive the Green's functions of different magnetically field-dressed systems, in particular of electronically highly excited atomic species in crossed electric and magnetic fields, so-called giant-dipole states. We determine the dynamical polarizability of atomic giant-dipole states as well as the adiabatic potential energy surfaces of giant-dipole molecules in the framework of the Green's function approach. Furthermore, we perform an comparative analysis of the latter to and exact diagonalization scheme and …
We report on light-shift tomography of a cloud of 87 Rb atoms in a far-detuned optical-dipole trap at 1565 nm. Our method is based on standard absorption imaging, but takes advantage of the strong light-shift of the excited state of the imaging transition, which is due to a quasi-resonance of the trapping laser with a higher excited level. We use this method to (i) map the equipotentials of a crossed optical-dipole trap, and (ii) study the thermalisation of an atomic cloud by following the evolution of the potential-energy of atoms during the free-evaporation process.
Paramagnetic, dipolar Hund's case-a radicals are considered in the presence of arbitrary, non-collinear combinations of electric and magnetic fields. The field-dependent part of the Hamiltonian is found to be exactly diagonalizable, and described by quantum numbers given by the projection of the molecule's total angular momentum along a space-fixed axis that is determined by both the fields and the electric and magnetic dipole moments of the molecule. In cases of strong fields, this procedure identifies a set of quantum numbers for the molecule in crossed fields. We dub this set a "Hund's case…
We present a detailed theoretical characterization of the two fundamental collective resonances underlying the xenon giant dipole resonance (GDR). This is achieved consistently by two complementary methods implemented within the framework of the configuration-interaction singles (CIS) theory. The first method accesses the resonance states by diagonalizing the many-electron Hamiltonian using the smooth exterior complex scaling technique. The second method involves a new application of the Gabor analysis to wave-packet dynamics. We identify one resonance at an excitation energy of 74 eV with a l…
We present a method for producing three-dimensional Bose-Einstein condensates using only laser cooling. The phase transition to condensation is crossed with $2.5 {\times} 10^{4}$ $^{87}\mathrm{Rb}$ atoms at a temperature of $T_{\mathrm{c}} = 0.6\ μ\mathrm{K}$ after 1.4 s of cooling. Atoms are trapped in a crossed optical dipole trap and cooled using Raman cooling with far-off-resonant optical pumping light to reduce atom loss and heating. The achieved temperatures are well below the effective recoil temperature. We find that during the final cooling stage at atomic densities above $10^{14}\ \m…
Free-electron lasers (FELs) produce short and very intense light pulses in the XUV and x-ray regimes. We investigate the possibility to drive Rabi oscillations in xenon with an intense FEL pulse by using the unusually large dipole strength of the giant-dipole resonance (GDR). The GDR decays within less than 30 as due to its position, which is above the $4d$ ionization threshold. We find that intensities around 10$^{18}$ W/cm$^2$ are required to induce Rabi oscillations with a period comparable to the lifetime. The pulse duration should not exceed 100 as because xenon will be fully ionized with…
We report on the achieving of Bose-Einstein condensation of a dilute atomic gas based on trapping atoms in tightly confining CO_2-laser dipole potentials. Quantum degeneracy of rubidium atoms is reached by direct evaporative cooling in both crossed and single beam trapping geometries. At the heart of these all-optical condensation experiments is the ability to obtain high initial atomic densities in quasistatic dipole traps by laser cooling techniques. Finally, we demonstrate the formation of a condensate in a field insensitive m_F=0 spin projection only. This suppresses fluctuations of the ch…
Multipole electric and magnetic giant resonances in metal clusters are reviewed and compared with their counterparts in atomic nuclei. The main attention is paid to E1 resonance (dipole plasmon).
A Kohn-Sham time-dependent local-density-functional scheme is utilized to predict attosecond time delays of xenon 4d photoionization that involves the 4d giant dipole resonance and Cooper minimum. The fundamental effect of electron correlations to uniquely determine the delay at both regions is demonstrated. In particular, for the giant dipole resonance, the delay underpins strong collective effect, emulating the recent prediction at C60 giant plasmon resonance [T. Barillot et al, Phys. Rev. A 91, 033413 (2015)]. For the Cooper minimum, a qualitative similarity with a photorecombination experi…
Effects of weak electric fields on resonant energy transfer between NH$_3$ in the X $^1$A$_1$ ground electronic state, and Rydberg He atoms in triplet states with principal quantum numbers $n = 36$-$41$ have been studied in a crossed beam apparatus. For these values of $n$, electric-dipole transitions between the Rydberg states that evolve adiabatically to the $|ns\rangle$ and $|np\rangle$ states in zero electric field can be tuned into resonance with the ground-state inversion transitions in NH$_3$ using electric fields, with energy transfer occurring via Förster resonance. In the experiments…
