Prospects of forming ultracold molecules in double-Sigma states by magnetoassociation of alkali-metal atoms with Yb

Brue, Daniel A.; Hutson, Jeremy M.

doi:10.1103/physreva.87.052709

Prospects of forming ultracold molecules in double-Sigma states by magnetoassociation of alkali-metal atoms with Yb

Brue, Daniel A.; Hutson, Jeremy M.

Authors

Daniel A. Brue

Professor Jeremy Hutson j.m.hutson@durham.ac.uk
Professor

Abstract

We explore the feasibility of producing ultracold diatomic molecules with nonzero electric and magnetic dipole moments by magnetically associating two atoms, one with zero electron spin and one with nonzero spin. Feshbach resonances arise through the dependence of the hyperfine coupling on internuclear distance.We survey the Feshbach resonances in diatomic systems combining the nine stable alkali-metal isotopes with those of Yb, focusing on the illustrative examples of RbYb and CsYb. We show that the resonance widths may expressed as a product of physically comprehensible terms in the framework of Fermi’s golden rule. The resonance widths depend strongly on the background scattering length, which may be adjusted by selecting the Yb isotope, and on the hyperfine coupling constant and the magnetic field. In favorable cases the resonances may be over 100 mG wide.

Citation

Brue, D. A., & Hutson, J. M. (2013). Prospects of forming ultracold molecules in double-Sigma states by magnetoassociation of alkali-metal atoms with Yb. Physical Review A, 87(5), Article 052709. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreva.87.052709

Journal Article Type	Article
Publication Date	May 1, 2013
Deposit Date	Jan 13, 2014
Publicly Available Date	Jan 24, 2014
Journal	Physical Review A
Print ISSN	1050-2947
Electronic ISSN	1094-1622
Publisher	American Physical Society
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	87
Issue	5
Article Number	052709
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1103/physreva.87.052709