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Physical Review Letters

Photoproduction of Spin-Polarized Hydrogen Atoms and Electrons in Mixtures of Cesium Vapor and Hydrogen Gas

Natarajan D. Bhaskar, James C. Camparo, Martin Ligare, W. Happer

Published May 25, 1981• 7 citations
Publisher

Abstract

First observations of the photogeneration of spin-polarized hydrogen atoms and electrons are reported. A mixture of cesium vapor and helium and hydrogen buffer gases is optically pumped with a circularly polarized tunable---dye-laser beam (4593 \AA{}). The paramagnetic species (H atoms, ${e}^{\ensuremath{-}}$) generated by the laser-induced processes are detected with use of spin-exchange-magnetic-resonance spectroscopy.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.46.1387

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First observations of the photogeneration of spin-polarized hydrogen atoms and electrons are reported. A mixture of cesium vapor and helium and hydrogen buffer gases is optically pumped with a circularly polarized tunable---dye-laser beam (4593 \AA{}). The paramagnetic species (H atoms, e\ensuremath−{e}^{\ensuremath{-}}e\ensuremath−) generated by the laser-induced processes are detected with use of spin-exchange-magnetic-resonance spectroscopy.
We have produced highly spin-polarized atomic hydrogen by spin-exchange optical pumping. A tunable ring dye laser is used to polarize rubidium atoms by optical pumping. The cell containing the rubidium vapor is coated with paraffin in order to reduce spin relaxation due to wall collisions. Hydrogen gas is dissociated in an inductive discharge and flows continuously through the cell, in which the hydrogen atoms are polarized by spin-exchange collisions with the polarized rubidium atoms. Atomic-hydrogen polarization as high as 2〈Jz{\mathit{J}}_{\mathit{z}}Jz​〉H{\mathrm{〉}}_{\mathrm{H}}〉H​=0.72(6) has been observed, which is the highest polarization yet produced by this method. However, the rubidium polarization may be limited to this value due to radiation trapping at higher rubidium densities. The spin-relaxation rate of atomic hydrogen on a paraffin-coated cell is also measured and corresponds to about 7600 wall bounces between wall relaxation.
A cesium atomic beam having a high degree of polarization is prepared by optical pumping with two circularly polarized diode lasers, and a technique for state-sensitive atomic detection involving laser-induced fluorescence in a magnetic field (LIFB) is introduced. An atomic-beam polarization of 93% is measured using the LIFB technique, and the combined use of optical-state preparation and LIFB detection in an atomic-recoil experiment to study spin-changing electron-atom collisions is demonstrated.
A cesium atomic beam having a high degree of polarization is prepared by optical pumping with two circularly polarized diode lasers, and a technique for state-sensitive atomic detection involving laser-induced fluorescence in a magnetic field (LIFB) is introduced. An atomic-beam polarization of 93% is measured using the LIFB technique, and the combined use of optical-state preparation and LIFB detection in an atomic-recoil experiment to study spin-changing electron-atom collisions is demonstrated.
It has been demonstrated that optical pumping of alkali atoms (rubidium and cesium) results to a highly efficient indirect optical orientation of metastable He (2 3 S 1 ) atoms. However, in an attempt to perform the inverse experiment (i.e. to receive spin-polarization of alkali atoms upon optical pumping of metastable helium atoms) the result was quite unexpected: the magnetic resonance signal of Cs or Rb atoms was very weak (several hundred times weaker compared to conventional optical pumping of helium in the presence of cesium (rubidium)). We propose an explanation for the unusually small ratio of the magnetic resonance signals from Cs (Rb) and metastable He atoms under condition of optical orientation of He atoms. Except of Cs atoms we are the first to have observed magnetic resonance signals from atoms of 85 Rb and 87 Rb isotopes when using the indirect optical orientation in conditions of helium-rubidium gas discharge plasma. It is shown that the anomaly in the amplitude ratios of the observed MR signals can be explained by the unidirectional action of three different factors (the presence of a large nuclear spin of alkali atoms, depolarization of alkali atoms between collisions, and spin exchange between atoms of rubidium isotopes (for the He-Rb system).
The ground state magnetic sublevel populations of a cesium atomic beam have been measured by laser-induced fluorescence in a 430 G magnetic field. The detected induced fluorescence spectrum is in excellent agreement with calculation. After preparing the beam in the F=4, M=-4 state by optical pumping with diode lasers, this novel detection technique was used to measure a 93% spin polarization of the atomic beam. We have also demonstrated the use of this technique to detect changes in atomic spin after collisions with electrons.
In a helium–hydrogen mixture at T = 300 K, the polarization degree of hydrogen spins, both electron and nuclear, was determined to be as high as (5 ± 1)%. The role of the main processes giving rise to the formation of spin-polarized H atoms has been discussed. It is shown that an effective transfer of angular momentum from the preliminarily optically oriented He * (2 3 S 1 ) atoms to the H atoms is not due to the direct chemi-dissociation of the H 2 molecules by the He * atoms alone, or due to Penning ionization of these molecules followed by the ion-molecular rearrangement reaction H 2 + + H 2 → H 3 + + H alone, but to their summary action. The relative importance of the two mechanisms depends on the rotational temperature and total gas pressure.