Ionization of Rydberg atoms embedded in Ultracold Plasma due to electron-atom interaction

TL;DR

This paper develops a quantum mechanical model to analyze electron-Rydberg atom interactions in ultracold plasma, accurately predicting ionization cross sections and explaining experimental observations of ionization rates.

Contribution

It provides an analytical calculation of electron-Rydberg atom scattering cross sections, linking the ionization behavior to the scattering length and orbital radius, aligning with experimental data.

Findings

Analytical cross sections match experimental ionization data.

Ionization rate increases rapidly above certain Rydberg states.

The relation between scattering length and orbital radius explains ionization behavior.

Abstract

When ultracold plasma is generated using photonization of laser cooled atoms, some atoms reach only upto Rydberg states. These in turn interact with the free electrons of the plasma and get ionized further. We study the interaction of electron-Rydberg atom using potential scattering technique in quantum mechanical domain and compute the associated cross sections for Cesium atoms, analytically. We notice a close agreement with the experimental data of ionization of Rydberg atoms as reported in Phys. Rev. A 71, 013416 (2005). The experiments showed a rapid increase in ionization above a specific Rydberg state. Our theory supports the same, and also indicates that this is due to the relation between scattering length and the radius of the orbit.