Dramatic Reductions in Inelastic Cross Sections for Ultracold Collisions near Feshbach Resonances

2009/08/14 by Jeremy M. Hutson, Musie Beyene, Maykel Leonardo Gonzalez-Martinez +1
Physics and Astronomy · #Atomic physics #Cold Atom Physics and Bose-Einstein Condensates #Collision #Feshbach resonance #Inelastic collision #Inelastic scattering #Molecule #Nuclear physics #Physics #Quantum mechanics #Quantum, superfluid, helium dynamics #Resonance (particle physics) #Scattering #Strong Light-Matter Interactions #physics.atom-ph #physics.chem-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.103.163201

published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 103, 163201 (2009) · 4 pages, 3 Figures

arxiv created 2009/08/14 · openalex publication_date 2009/10/12 · arxiv updated 2015/05/13 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05

Abstract

We show that low-energy inelastic cross sections can decrease as well as increase in the vicinity of a zero-energy Feshbach resonance. When an external field is used to tune across such a resonance, the real and imaginary parts of the scattering length show asymmetric oscillations with both peaks and troughs. In favorable circumstances, the inelastic collision rate can be reduced to almost zero. This may be important for efforts to achieve evaporative and sympathetic cooling for molecules.

Citations

• Quantum Gas of Deeply Bound Ground State Molecules
• Feshbach resonances in ultracold atomic and molecular collisions: threshold behaviour and suppression of poles in scattering lengths
• Optical Pumping and Vibrational Cooling of Molecules
• Prospects for producing ultracoldNH3molecules by sympathetic cooling: A survey of interaction potentials
• Effects of Configuration Interaction on Intensities and Phase Shifts