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Chinese Physics Letters

Time-Resolved Measurements of the Adsorption/Desorption of Rb Atoms on Octadecyltrichlorosilane Coated Surfaces

Kang-Jia Liao, Meiling Wang, Guiying Zhang, Kai-Feng Zhao

Published Jul 1, 2015• 7 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We carry out the first time-resolved measurement of Rb atoms desorbing from octadecyltrichlorosilane coated surfaces by polarizing the atoms near the surface using an evanescent wave pump pulse and watching the subsequent intensity change of another evanescent wave probe beam, and find the mean adsorption (dwell) time to be about 400 ns at a cell body temperature of 112°C. The adsorption energy is found to be 0.19 eV from the surface temperature dependence of the adsorption time. This method can be extended to study the adsorption/desorption process of other alkali atoms on other surfaces of transparent substrates with an ultimate time resolution limited by the flight time of atoms in the evanescent wave which is of the order of nanoseconds.

DOI
10.1088/0256-307x/32/7/076801

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We carry out the first time-resolved measurement of Rb atoms desorbing from octadecyltrichlorosilane coated surfaces by polarizing the atoms near the surface using an evanescent wave pump pulse and watching the subsequent intensity change of another evanescent wave probe beam, and find the mean adsorption (dwell) time to be about 400 ns at a cell body temperature of 112°C. The adsorption energy is found to be 0.19 eV from the surface temperature dependence of the adsorption time. This method can be extended to study the adsorption/desorption process of other alkali atoms on other surfaces of transparent substrates with an ultimate time resolution limited by the flight time of atoms in the evanescent wave which is of the order of nanoseconds.
We report the measurement of dwell times of spin polarized Rb atoms on octadecyltrichlorosilane (OTS)- and paraffin-coated surfaces. We find that at a cell temperature of 72 °C the dwell times for OTS- and paraffin-coated surfaces are 0.9±0.1 μs and 1.8±0.2 μs, respectively. Since the relaxation probability on paraffin is almost one order of magnitude smaller than that on OTS, the longer dwell time for paraffin indicates that the average strength of the interactions experienced by Rb atoms while they are inside paraffin is much weaker than while they are inside OTS.
We present a simple method for directly measuring the average dwell time of spin-polarized Rb atoms on coated Pyrex glass surfaces. The method relies on the light shift of the Zeeman resonances of spin-polarized Rb atoms pumped and probed by evanescent waves, and does not depend on the microscopic details of surface interactions. We use a cell whose length is adjustable between 70 and $500\text{ }\text{ }\ensuremath{\mu}\mathrm{m}$. The inverse of the difference between the frequency shifts caused by ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}^{+}$ and ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}^{\ensuremath{-}}$ pump beams depends linearly on the cell length, from which we obtain the average dwell time ${\ensuremath{\tau}}_{s}$. For a Pyrex glass cell coated with octadecyltrichlorosilane we find that ${\ensuremath{\tau}}_{s}=0.53\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.03\text{ }\text{ }\ensuremath{\mu}\mathrm{s}$ at a cell wall temperature of $103\text{ }\ifmmode^\circ\else\textdegree\fi{}\mathrm{C}$. The temperature dependence of ${\ensuremath{\tau}}_{s}$ is fitted to ${\ensuremath{\tau}}_{s}={\overline{\ensuremath{\tau}}}_{0}\mathrm{exp}({E}_{a}/kT)$, yielding a preexponential factor ${\overline{\ensuremath{\tau}}}_{0}={2.2}_{\ensuremath{-}1.4}^{+5.1}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{ns}$ and an activation energy ${E}_{a}=0.19\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.03\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{eV}$.
A new spectroscopic technique for studying adsorption of atoms at a transparent dielectric surface is exploited. A quantitative comparison of the Autler-Townes splitting in measured and calculated, surface temperature-dependent two-photon evanescent wave spectra provides values of the adsorption energy, the preexponential factor for the rate of desorption and the polarizability of alkali atoms, adsorbed on a glass surface. It is speculated that this technique could form the basis for future two-photon control of atoms close to dielectric surfaces.
Methods commonly used in surface science have difficulties in studying surface interaction between spin polarized atoms and anti-relaxation coatings in sealed atomic vapour cells. The average dwell time of atom-wall collisions can provide important information for understanding the atom surface interaction. Here we present a simple method for directly measuring the average dwell time of spin polarized rubidium atoms on coated glass surfaces. The method relies on evanescent-wave induced light shift of the Zeeman resonance of Rb atomic spins, and does not depend on the microscopic details of surface interactions. This is the only reliable method currently available for measuring surface dwell time of spin polarized atoms sealed in vapor cells.
We describe a method for characterizing self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) in terms of their performance as antirelaxation wall coatings for alkali atom vapor cells. A combination of initial surface analysis and subsequent laser spectroscopy is used to provide insight into the quality of the coating, as well as its performance under the exposure to alkalis as it occurs, for example, when used in applications such as atomic magnetometers or clocks. Fused silica plates coated with octadecyltrichlorosilane SAMs were used to make cubic R87b gas cells. The surface was characterized by x-ray diffraction, contact angle measurements, and atomic force microscopy. Measurements of hyperfine resonance linewidths and frequency shifts show that the rubidium vapor atoms collide up to 40 times with the walls of the cells before their coherence relaxes and their adsorption energy is around 0.065 eV. Chemical analysis of the cell indicates some weak reactions between the coating and the rubidium atoms.
Observation of nonthermal, light-induced desorption of Cs and Rb atoms from paraffin coating is reported. Buffer-gas-free paraffin-coated cells containing Cs and Rb were exposed to laser light of various intensities and frequencies, and the change of the vapor densities as a function of time was investigated. Because atomic polarization relaxes very slowly in paraffin-coated cells (spin-relaxation times can be $\ensuremath{\gtrsim}1\mathrm{s}),$ they are applied in a variety of precision measurements (e.g., magnetometry, discrete symmetry tests, etc.). Light-induced desorption may be useful in such measurements as a method to control atomic density without changing the temperature of the cell.