Measurement of the temperature dependence of dwell time and spin relaxation probability of Rb atoms on paraffin surfaces using a beam-scattering method

TL;DR

This study investigates how the dwell time and spin relaxation probability of Rb atoms on paraffin surfaces vary with temperature, using beam-scattering and time-resolved methods, revealing minimal temperature dependence.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed measurement of temperature effects on Rb atom dwell time and spin relaxation on paraffin surfaces using a beam-scattering approach.

Findings

No significant change in spin relaxation probability with temperature.

Mean surface dwell time increases slightly with cooling, but less than expected.

Surface scattering involves a small component with much longer dwell times.

Abstract

The scattering of Rb atoms on an anti-relaxation coating was studied. No significant change in the spin relaxation probability of Rb atoms by single scattering from a tetracontane surface was observed by cooling the film from 305 to 123 K. The mean surface dwell time was estimated using a time-resolved method.Delay-time spectra, from which mean surface dwell times can be estimated, were measured at 305, 153, and 123 K, with a time window of $9.3\times 10^{-5}$ s. The increase in mean surface dwell time with cooling from 305 to 123 K was smaller than $4.4\times 10^{-6}$ s, which is significantly smaller than the value expected from the mean dwell time at room temperature measured using the Larmor frequency shift. These results can be explained by assuming a small number of scattering components, with a mean surface dwell time at least three orders of magnitude longer than the majority component.