- Physical Review Journals
All JournalsPhysics Magazine

Physical Review A

Reuse & Permissions

It is not necessary to obtain permission to reuse this article or its components as it is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI are maintained. Please note that some figures may have been included with permission from other third parties. It is your responsibility to obtain the proper permission from the rights holder directly for these figures.

Export citation

Export citation

Choose format for download:

Download Citation
  • Open Access

Photoassociation of Sr84 n1D2 ultralong-range Rydberg dimers

C. Wang1, A. Li1, S. K. Kanungo1, T. C. Killian1, F. B. Dunning1, and S. Yoshida2

PDF

Phys. Rev. A 113, 052802 – Published 4 May, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/ppv2-mlfd

Abstract

Measurements of the production of 5snd1D2–5s21S0 ultralong-range Rydberg dimers through photoassocation in an ultracold Sr84 atomic gas are reported. The molecular potential associated with the Rydberg D state is anisotropic and the molecular states are characterized by the vibrational quantum number ν and the total angular momentum K⃗=L⃗+N⃗, where L⃗ and N⃗ are the electronic orbital angular momentum and rotational angular momentum, respectively. The measured molecular binding energies agree reasonably well with theoretical predictions. Additionally, the electron-atom scattering leads to broader line shapes in the photoassociation spectrum than might be expected simply from the angular momentum of the initial colliding cold-atom pairs.

View figure in article

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Corrections

5 August, 2026

Correction: A typographical error in Eq. (4) has been fixed.

Article Text

References (27)

  1. C. H. Greene, A. S. Dickinson, and H. R. Sadeghpour, Creation of polar and nonpolar ultra-long-range Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 2458 (2000).
  2. F. B. Dunning, S. K. Kanungo, and S. Yoshida, Ultralong-range Rydberg molecules, J. Phys. B 57, 212002 (2024).
  3. V. Bendkowsky, B. Butscher, J. Nipper, J. P. Shaffer, R. Löw, and T. Pfau, Observation of ultralong-range Rydberg molecules, Nature (London) 458, 1005 (2009).
  4. J. P. Shaffer, S. T. Rittenhouse, and H. R. Sadeghpour, Ultracold Rydberg molecules, Nat. Commun. 9, 1965 (2018).
  5. C. Fey, F. Hummel, and P. Schmelcher, Ultralong-range Rydberg molecules, Mol. Phys. 118, e1679401 (2020).
  6. H. Saßmannshausen, J. Deiglmayr, and F. Merkt, Long-range Rydberg molecules, Rydberg macrodimers and Rydberg aggregates in an ultracold Cs gas, Eur. Phys. J. Spec. Top. 225, 2891 (2016).
  7. C. Lippe, T. Eichert, O. Thomas, T. Niederprüm, and H. Ott, Excitation of Rydberg molecules in ultracold quantum gases, Phys. Status Solidi B 256, 1800654 (2019).
  8. M. T. Eiles, Trilobites, butterflies, and other exotic specimens of long-range Rydberg molecules, J. Phys. B 52, 113001 (2019).
  9. M. Schlagmüller, T. C. Liebisch, H. Nguyen, G. Lochead, F. Engel, F. Böttcher, K. M. Westphal, K. S. Kleinbach, R. Löw, S. Hofferberth, T. Pfau, J. Pérez-Ríos, and C. H. Greene, Probing an electron scattering resonance using Rydberg molecules within a dense and ultracold gas, Phys. Rev. Lett. 116, 053001 (2016).
  10. J. D. Whalen, S. K. Kanungo, R. Ding, M. Wagner, R. Schmidt, H. R. Sadeghpour, S. Yoshida, J. Burgdörfer, F. B. Dunning, and T. C. Killian, Probing nonlocal spatial correlations in quantum gases with ultra-long-range Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. A 100, 011402(R) (2019).
  11. S. K. Kanungo, Y. Lu, F. B. Dunning, S. Yoshida, J. Burgdörfer, and T. C. Killian, Measuring nonlocal three-body spatial correlations with Rydberg trimers in ultracold quantum gases, Phys. Rev. A 107, 033322 (2023).
  12. F. Camargo, R. Schmidt, J. D. Whalen, R. Ding, G. Woehl, S. Yoshida, J. Burgdörfer, F. B. Dunning, H. R. Sadeghpour, E. Demler, and T. C. Killian, Creation of Rydberg polarons in a Bose gas, Phys. Rev. Lett. 120, 083401 (2018).
  13. R. Schmidt, J. D. Whalen, R. Ding, F. Camargo, G. Woehl, S. Yoshida, J. Burgdörfer, F. B. Dunning, E. Demler, H. R. Sadeghpour, and T. C. Killian, Theory of excitation of Rydberg polarons in an atomic quantum gas, Phys. Rev. A 97, 022707 (2018).
  14. A. Gaj, A. Krupp, J. Balewski, et al., From molecular spectra to a density shift in dense Rydberg gases, Nat. Commun. 5, 4546 (2014).
  15. H. Saßmannshausen, F. Merkt, and J. Deiglmayr, Experimental characterization of singlet scattering channels in long-range Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. Lett. 114, 133201 (2015).
  16. D. A. Anderson, S. A. Miller, and G. Raithel, Photoassociation of long-range nD Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 163201 (2014).
  17. A. T. Krupp, A. Gaj, J. B. Balewski, P. Ilzhöfer, S. Hofferberth, R. Löw, T. Pfau, M. Kurz, and P. Schmelcher, Alignment of D-state Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 143008 (2014).
  18. M. Althön, M. Exner, R. Blättner, and H. Ott, Exploring the vibrational series of pure trilobite Rydberg molecules, Nat. Commun. 14, 8108 (2023).
  19. J. D. Whalen, F. Camargo, R. Ding, T. C. Killian, F. B. Dunning, J. Pérez-Ríos, S. Yoshida, and J. Burgdörfer, Lifetimes of ultralong-range strontium Rydberg molecules in a dense Bose-Einstein condensate, Phys. Rev. A 96, 042702 (2017).
  20. O. Thomas, C. Lippe, T. Eichert, and H. Ott, Photoassociation of rotating ultra-long range Rydberg molecules, J. Phys. B 51, 155201 (2018).
  21. F. Hummel, P. Schmelcher, and M. T. Eiles, Vibronic interactions in trilobite and butterfly Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. Res. 5, 013114 (2023).
  22. P. Giannakeas, M. T. Eiles, F. Robicheaux, and J. M. Rost, Generalized local frame-transformation theory for ultralong-range Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. A 102, 033315 (2020).
  23. B. J. DeSalvo, J. A. Aman, F. B. Dunning, T. C. Killian, H. R. Sadeghpour, S. Yoshida, and J. Burgdörfer, Ultra-long-range Rydberg molecules in a divalent atomic system, Phys. Rev. A 92, 031403(R) (2015).
  24. J. D. Whalen, S. K. Kanungo, Y. Lu, S. Yoshida, J. Burgdörfer, F. B. Dunning, and T. C. Killian, Heteronuclear Rydberg molecules, Phys. Rev. A 101, 060701(R) (2020).
  25. R. Ding, S. K. Kanungo, J. D. Whalen, T. C. Killian, F. B. Dunning, S. Yoshida, and J. Burgdörfer, Creation of vibrationally-excited ultralong-range Rydberg molecules in polarized and unpolarized cold gases of Sr87, J. Phys. B 53, 014002 (2020).
  26. F. Hummel, C. Fey, and P. Schmelcher, Spin-interaction effects for ultralong-range Rydberg molecules in a magnetic field, Phys. Rev. A 97, 043422 (2018).
  27. C. Wang, Intramolecular electronic and rotational angular momentum coupling in Sr84 n1D2 ultralong-range Rydberg dimers (Harvard Dataverse, Cambridge, 2025), https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/OF6WGF.

Outline

Information

Phys. Rev. A 113, 052802– Published 4 May, 2026
  • Received 9 January 2026
  • Accepted 7 April 2026
  • Corrected 5 August 2026
Crossmark - Check for updates button
Creative Commons Logo

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

Published by the American Physical Society

Sign In to Your Journals Account

Filter

Filter

Article Lookup

Enter a citation