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Phys. Rev. A 68, 032508 (2003) [7 pages]

Optical pumping of metastable NH radicals into the paramagnetic ground state

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Sebastiaan Y. T. van de Meerakker1, Boris G. Sartakov2, Allard P. Mosk1, Rienk T. Jongma1, and Gerard Meijer1,3,4
1FOM–Institute for Plasmaphysics Rijnhuizen, P.O. Box 1207, NL-3430 BE Nieuwegein, The Netherlands
2General Physics Institute RAS, Vavilov street 38, 119991 Moscow, Russia
3Department of Molecular and Laser Physics, University of Nijmegen, Toernooiveld 1, NL-6525 ED Nijmegen, The Netherlands
4Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Faradayweg 4-6, D-14195 Berlin, Germany

Received 19 May 2003; published 15 September 2003

We here report on the optical pumping of both 14NH and 15NH radicals from the metastable a 1Δ state into the X 3Σ- ground state in a molecular beam experiment. By inducing the hitherto unobserved spin-forbidden A 3Π←a 1Δ transition, followed by spontaneous emission to the X 3Σ- state, a unidirectional pathway for population transfer from the metastable state into the electronic ground state is obtained. The optical pumping scheme demonstrated here opens up the possibility to accumulate NH radicals in a magnetic or optical trap.


©2003 The American Physical Society

URL: http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevA.68.032508
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.68.032508
PACS: 33.70.Ca, 33.80.Ps, 33.70.Fd, 33.20.Kf

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