Journal of Applied Physics
Effect of anisotropy on atomic fluorescence: Influence on the detection of a hyperfine transition in a cesium beam
G. Théobald, N. Dimarcq, V. Giordano, A. Hamel, P. Cérez
Abstract
The problem of the fluorescence anisotropy resulting from alignment in the excited state is investigated in the case of a cesium beam illuminated by a broadband laser diode tuned to the cesium D2 line. Its effect on the collection efficiency is derived when photon fluorescence collection is performed inside a small solid angle about the quantization axis. Excitation schemes leading to a noticeable increase of the fluorescence yield are pointed out and experimental results agree quite well with the predictions.