# Imaging the Rovibrational Ground State of the Helium–Neon Dimers 4He20Ne and 4He22Ne

## TL;DR

This paper uses Coulomb explosion imaging to study the structure and energy of helium–neon dimers in their ground state.

## Contribution

The study experimentally determines the rovibrational ground state and binding energy of 4He20Ne and 4He22Ne dimers.

## Key findings

- The pair distance distributions of 4He20Ne and 4He22Ne were measured in their rovibrational ground state.
- The binding energy of each dimer was extracted from the measured pair distance distribution.
- The helium–neon potential was accessed through the pair distance distribution data.

## Abstract

The helium–neon dimer has been subject to many
theoretical
studies, in which the interaction potential of the helium–neon
system has been calculated with ever increasing accuracy. Calculations
predict that the helium–neon system supports only a few bound
states, which makes the system inaccessible to standard spectroscopic
techniques. Previous experiments have probed the helium–neon
potential by comparing measured and predicted scattering cross sections.
However, the spatial structure and energetics of the bound states
of the helium–neon system have not been studied experimentally
in great detail. We employ Coulomb explosion imaging (CEI) to measure
the pair distance distributions of the helium–neon dimers 4He20Ne and 4He22Ne in their
rovibrational ground state. For each dimer, the binding energy is
extracted from the measured pair distance distribution. Additionally,
the pair distance distribution provides access to the helium–neon
potential.