Physical Review A
Excitation-transfer collisions in cesium vapor: Cs(5 D5/2 )+Cs(6 S1/2 )→Cs (5 D3/2 )+ Cs(6 S1/2 )
B. Keramati, Mark F. Masters, John Huennekens
Abstract
We report an experimental investigation of the excitation-transfer collision Cs(5${D}_{5/2}$)+Cs(6S)\ensuremath{\rightarrow}CS ((5${D}_{3/2}$)+Cs(6S). The upper 5${D}_{5/2}$ state was excited by a cw dye laser tuned to the one-photon, quadrupole-allowed 6S\ensuremath{\rightarrow}5${D}_{5/2}$ transition. Since the direct 5D\ensuremath{\rightarrow}6P fluorescence could not be detected with our apparatus, we monitored instead the cascade 6P\ensuremath{\rightarrow}6S fluorescence. The ratio of 6${P}_{1/2}$ to 6${P}_{3/2}$ fluorescence contains information on the collisional mixing that takes place in the 5D levels but also includes a significant contribution from mixing in the 6P levels. This latter contribution could effectively be subtracted out using the results of a second experiment in which a tunable cw diode laser was used to pump the 6${P}_{3/2}$ state, and the same fluorescence ratio monitored. The 5D mixing cross section we obtain, 70 A${\r{}}^{2}$, is significantly larger than previous indirect determinations.