11:15 AM–2:15 PM, Monday, March 10, 2008
Morial Convention Center - 218
Sponsoring Unit:
DCP
Chair: Roland Wester, University of Freiburg
12:03 PM–12:15 PM
Lisdat Christian
(Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, Braunschweig, Germany)
Oleg Bucicov
(Institute of Quantum Optics, Leibniz University Hannover, Germany)
Marcin Nowak
(Institute of Quantum Optics, Leibniz University Hannover, Germany)
Sebastian Jung
(Institute of Quantum Optics, Leibniz University Hannover, Germany)
Eberhard Tiemann
(Institute of Quantum Optics, Leibniz University Hannover, Germany)
We discuss the possibility to use the photodissociation of cold SO$_2$ molecules to produce internally and translationally cold photofragments SO and O. It is expected from our measurements of the molecular Stark effect~[1] that the dissociation pathways and excess energies of the fragments are tunable by electric fields~[2]. Cold SO$_2$ molecules are produced by Stark deceleration. We have realized a Stark decelerator that is able to slow down packages SO$_2$ in weak-field seeking levels to a few 10~m/s center of mass velocity. A Stark decelerator with 326~stages is required for this purpose, since the ratio of Stark shift to initial kinetic energy is small for SO$_2$. The photofragments SO and O have triplet ground states, while the ground state of SO$_2$ is diamagnetic. In combination with the photodissociation at the threshold we want to employ this constellation to accumulate fragments in a magnetic trap by dissociating SO$_2$ as it is stopped by electric fields in the center of the trap. \newline [1] J. Phys. B \textbf{39}, S1085 (2006). \newline [2] Phys. Rev.~A \textbf{74}, 040701(R) (2006).