Light-Assisted Ion-Neutral Reactive Processes in the Cold Regime: Radiative Molecule Formation versus Charge Exchange

Felix H. J. Hall, Mireille Aymar, Nadia Bouloufa-Maafa, Olivier Dulieu, Stefan Willitsch
2011 Physical Review Letters  
We present a combined experimental and theoretical study of cold reactive collisions between laser-cooled Ca+ ions and Rb atoms in an ion-atom hybrid trap. We observe rich chemical dynamics which are interpreted in terms of non-adiabatic and radiative charge exchange as well as radiative molecule formation using high-level electronic structure calculations. We study the role of light-assisted processes and show that the efficiency of the dominant chemical pathways is considerably enhanced in
more » ... ited reaction channels. Our results illustrate the importance of radiative and non-radiative processes for the cold chemistry occurring in ion-atom hybrid traps.
doi:10.1103/physrevlett.107.243202 pmid:22242998 fatcat:hv4gfnyb7jhb7fg5wb6pdixifu