Magnetic field dependent interactions in an ultracold Li–Yb(3P2) mixture. (7th May 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Dowd, William; Roy, Richard J; Shrestha, Rajendra K; Petrov, Alexander; Makrides, Constantinos; Kotochigova, Svetlana; Gupta, Subhadeep
• Is Part Of: New journal of physics. Volume 17:Number 5(2015:May)
• Publication Date: 2015-05-07
• Subjects: ultracold molecules -- Feshbach resonance -- anisotropic interactions; Physics -- Periodicals; Physics; Periodicals; 530.05
• DOI: 10.1088/1367-2630/17/5/055007
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1367-2630

Abstract

Abstract: Magnetic Feshbach resonances have allowed great success in the production of ultracold diatomic molecules from bi-alkali mixtures, but have so far eluded observation in mixtures of alkali and alkaline-earth-like atoms. Inelastic collisional properties of ultracold atomic systems exhibit resonant behavior in the vicinity of such resonances, providing a detection signature. We study magnetic field dependent inelastic effects via atom loss spectroscopy in an ultracold heteronuclear mixture of alkali 6 Li in the ground state and alkaline-earth-like 174 Yb in an excited electronic metastable state ( 3 P2, ). We observe a variation of the interspecies inelastic two-body rate coefficient by nearly one order of magnitude over a 100–520 G magnetic field range. By comparing to ab initio calculations we link our observations to interspecies Feshbach resonances arising from anisotropic interactions in this novel collisional system.