Zeeman relaxation induced by spin-orbit coupling in cold antimony-helium collisions

• Main Authors: Connolly, Colin B. (Contributor), Au, Yat Shan (Contributor), Chae, Eunmi (Contributor), Tscherbul, Timur V. (Contributor), Buchachenko, Alexei A. (Author), Ketterle, Wolfgang (Contributor), Doyle, John M. (Contributor)
• Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics (Contributor), MIT-Harvard Center for Ultracold Atoms (Contributor)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Physical Society, 2013-08-27T15:01:26Z.
• Subjects: Article
• Online Access: Get fulltext

We investigate Zeeman relaxation in cold Sb([superscript 4]S[subscript 3/2]∘)-He collisions in a magnetic field. Ensembles of >10[superscript 13] laser-ablated Sb atoms are cooled in cryogenic [superscript 4]He buffer gas to 800 mK and inelastic collisions are observed to equilibrate the m[subscript J]-state distribution to the translational temperature. The ratio γ of momentum transfer to inelastic collision rates is measured to be ⩽9.1×10[superscript 2]. We also perform quantum scattering calculations of Sb-[superscript 4]He collisions, based on ab initio interaction potentials, that demonstrate significant anisotropy of the ground state induced by the spin-orbit interaction. Agreement is obtained between theory and experiment with a ≈10% increase in the ab initio potential depth. This work suggests that buffer-gas-cooled pnictogen atoms lighter than Sb can be loaded into a magnetic trap.
National Science Foundation (U.S.) (Grant PHY-1067990)
Harvard-MIT Center for Ultracold Atoms