Ultralong-range Rydberg molecules in combined electric and magnetic fields

TL;DR

This paper explores how combined electric and magnetic fields influence the structure and properties of ultralong-range Rydberg molecules, revealing controllable molecular alignment, orientation, and vibrational characteristics.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of the effects of combined fields on Rydberg molecules, including the role of p-wave interactions and the tunability of molecular properties.

Findings

External fields induce vibrational character in angular degrees of freedom.

Molecular alignment and orientation can be controlled via field parameters.

Electric dipole moments reach several kiloDebye, with rovibrational spacings of 2-250 MHz.

Abstract

We investigate the impact of combined electric and magnetic fields on the structure of ultralong-range polar Rydberg molecules. Our focus is hereby on the parallel as well as the crossed field configuration taking into account both the $s$-wave and $p$-wave interactions of the Rydberg electron and the neutral ground state atom. We show the strong impact of the $p$-wave interaction on the ultralong-range molecular states for a pure $B$-field configuration. In the presence of external fields the angular degrees of freedom acquires vibrational character and we encounter two- and three-dimensional oscillatory adiabatic potential energy surfaces for the parallel and crossed field configuration, respectively. The equilibrium configurations of local potential wells can be controlled via the external field parameters for both field configurations depending of the specific degree of electronic excitation. This allows to tune the molecular alignment and orientation. The resulting electric dipole moment is in the order of several kDebye and the rovibrational level spacings are in the range of $2-250$ MHz. Both properties are analyzed with of varying field strengths.