Stability of (3)He(2)(4)He(n) and (3)He(3)(4)He(n) L=0 clusters

We have studied the stability of mixed (3)He/(4)He clusters in L=0 states by the diffusion Monte Carlo method, employing the Tang-Toennies-Yiu He-He potential. The clusters (3)He(4)He(N) and (3)He(2)(4)He(N) are stable for N>1. The lighter atoms tend to move to the surface of the cluster. The minimum number of 4He atoms able to bind three 3He atoms in a L=0 state is nine. Two of three fermionic helium atoms stay on the surface, while the third one penetrates into the cluster.     

Primary populations of metastable antiprotonic (4)He and (3)He atoms

Initial distributions of metastable antiprotonic (4)He and (3)He atoms over principal (n) and angular momentum (l) quantum numbers have been deduced using laser spectroscopy experiments. The regions n = 37-40 and n = 35-38 in the two atoms account for almost all of the observed fractions [(3.0 +/- 0.1)% and (2.4 +/- 0.1)%] of antiprotons captured into metastable states.     

Laser spectroscopic determination of the 6He nuclear charge radius

We have performed precision laser spectroscopy on individual 6He (t(1/2)=0.8 s) atoms confined and cooled in a magneto-optical trap, and measured the isotope shift between 6He and 4He to be 43 194.772+/-0.056 MHz for the 2(3)S1-3(3)P2 transition. Based on this measurement and atomic theory, the nuclear charge radius of 6He is determined for the first time in a method independent of nuclear models to be 2.054+/-0.014 fm. The result is compared with the values predicted by a number of nuclear structure calculations and tests their ability to characterize this loosely bound halo nucleus.     

Simultaneous magneto-optical trapping of a boson-fermion mixture of metastable helium atoms

We simultaneously confine fermionic metastable 3He atoms and bosonic metastable 4He atoms in a magneto-optical trap. The trapped clouds, containing up to 1.5 x 10(8) atoms of each isotope, are characterized by measuring ions and metastable helium atoms escaping from the trap. Optical pumping of 3He atoms to a nontrapped hyperfine state is investigated and it is shown that large atom numbers can be confined without additional repumping lasers. Unique possibilities for quantum degeneracy experiments with mixtures of spin-polarized metastable 3He and 4He atoms are indicated.     

从大气压到超低气压范围的氦等离子体发射光谱的基本特性

采用三种实验装置(介质阻挡放电装置、空心阴极放电装置和彭宁放电装置)分别测量了不同压强范围内氦等离子体的发射光谱。通过对氦等离子体发射光谱的分析,已观察到一个共同的特点,就是在三种放电条件下产生的氦等离子体中31P1→21S0的谱线强度总是最强,可以推测亚稳态氦原子的含量相当显著,但不同的装置也有不同的特点,介质阻挡放电装置能够产生准辉光放电,谱线中氦原子的谱线强度很低,而空心阴极放电与彭宁放电装置能够产生稳定均匀的等离子体,且发射足够强的光辐射。我们已对所拍摄的光谱的谱线都进行了辨认,所有结果表明原子发射光谱分析法是研究不同条件下氦等离子体状态的一种十分有效的手段。     

Quantized vortices in mixed 3He-4He drops

Using density functional theory, we investigate the structure of mixed (3)He(N3)-(4)He(N4) droplets with an embedded impurity (Xe atom or HCN molecule) which pins a quantized vortex line. We find that the dopant+vortex+(4)He(N4) complex, which in a previous work [F. Dalfovo et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 1028 (2000)] was found to be energetically stable below a critical size N(cr), is robust against the addition of 3He. While 3He atoms are distributed along the vortex line and on the surface of the 4He drop, the impurity is mostly coated by 4He atoms. Results for N4 = 500 and a number of 3He atoms ranging from 0 to 100 are presented, and the binding energy of the dopant to the vortex line is determined.     

Bose-Einstein condensation of metastable helium

We have observed a Bose-Einstein condensate in a dilute gas of 4He in the (3)2S(1) metastable state. We find a critical temperature of (4.7+/-0.5) microK and a typical number of atoms at the threshold of 8 x 10(6). The maximum number of atoms in our condensate is about 5 x 10(5). An approximate value for the scattering length a = (16+/-8) nm is measured. The mean elastic collision rate at threshold is then estimated to be about 2 x 10(4) s(-1), indicating that we are deeply in the hydrodynamic regime. The typical decay time of the condensate is 2 s, which places an upper bound on the rate constants for two-body and three-body inelastic collisions.     

Observation of Andreev-Pushkarov vacancy clusters in phase-separated solid solutions of 4He in 3He

New features are observed for the pressure in a phase-separated dilute solid solution of ⁴He in ³He subjected to multiple temperature cycling within the phase-separation region. The results are explained within the framework of the hypothesis of A.F. Andreev and D.I. Pushkarov that the vacancies in a crystal without ideal periodicity are surrounded by clusters with a periodic structure. The equation for determining the radius of a cluster of pure ⁴He in a solution of ⁴He in ³He is refined. This hypothesis is shown to provide quantitative agreement between the calculated and experimental data under the assumption that the homogenization of the phase-separated solution is accompanied by the formation of metastable vacancies with a concentration of ～(4–5)×10^?5.     

Stability of 3He2 4He M and 3He3 4He M L = 0,1 Clusters

We have studied the stability of mixed ³He/⁴He clusters in L = 0 and L = 1 states by the diffusion Monte Carlo method, employing the Tang-Toennies-Yiu (TTY) He-He potential. The clusters ³He⁴He_M ( ) and ³He₂⁴He_M (L = 0, S = 0) are stable for M > 1, while to bind two ³He in a triplet state the minimum number of ⁴He is four. Considering clusters with three ³He, ³He₃⁴He₄ is the smallest stable system in the L = 1 state, while ³He₃⁴He₈ is the smallest stable system in the L = 0 state.     

Structure,rotational dynamics,and superfluidity of small OCS-doped He clusters

The structural and dynamical properties of carbonyl sulfide (OCS) molecules solvated in helium clusters are studied using reptation quantum Monte Carlo, for cluster sizes n=3-20 He atoms. Computer simulations allow us to establish a relation between the rotational spectrum of the solvated molecule and the structure of the He solvent, and of both with the onset of superfluidity. Our results agree with a recent spectroscopic study of this system and provide a more complex and detailed microscopic picture of this system than inferred from experiments.     

An equilateral model for the 4He trimer

A scaled He–He potential is used in conjunction with a model involving the radial motion of an equilateral array of three ⁴He atoms to study the bound state structure of the trimer. The separations between ground and first excited states are found to be considerably larger than some previous predictions.     

Bound states of 3He at the edge of a 4He drop on a cesium surface

We show that small amounts of 3He atoms, added to a 4He drop deposited on a flat cesium surface at zero temperature, populate bound states localized at the contact line. These edge states show up for drops large enough to develop well defined surface and bulk regions together with a contact line, and they are structurally different from the well-known Andreev states that appear at the free surface and at the liquid-solid interface of films. We illustrate the one-body density of 3He in a drop with 1000 4He atoms, and show that for a sufficiently large number of impurities the density profiles spread beyond the edge, coating both the curved drop surface and its flat base and eventually isolating it from the substrate.     

10-2～105 Pa气压范围的氦等离子体光谱分析

采用三种实验装置(介质阻挡放电装置、空心阴极放电装置和彭宁放电装置)分别测量了不同压强范围内氦等离子体的发射光谱.通过对氦等离子体发射光谱的分析,已观察到一个共同的特点,就是在三种放电条件下产生的氦等离子体中31P1→21S0的谱线强度总是最强,可以推测亚稳态氦原子的含量相当显著,但不同的装置也有不同的特点,介质阻挡放电装置能够产生准辉光放电,谱线中氦原子的谱线强度很低,而空心阴极放电与彭宁放电装置能够产生稳定均匀的等离子体,且发射足够强的光辐射.我们已对所拍摄的光谱的谱线都进行了辨认,所有结果表明原子发射光谱分析法是研究不同条件下氦等离子体状态的一种十分有效的手段.     

Microscopic theory of3He—4He solutions

The ring diagram contribution to the grand partition function of a mixture of fermions and bosons is obtained from a rigrous formula which extends the single component formula of Montroll and Ward. Together with the contributions from some other relevant graphs, it is applied to a dilute solution of³He with⁴He. For a small mass difference parameter, the ground state energy is shown to be expressed as a linear function of³He concentration. The coefficients of this energy expression are obtained explicitly for soft and hard-sphere potential models. From the energy, the differential volume coefficient is obtained also.This work was supported by ONR under Contract No. N00014-79-C-0451     

Self-consistent quantum structure of diffuse helium atom clusters

Diffuse clusters of arbitrary numbers of helium atoms are treated in a mean-field theory of the many-body system. The nonlinear Hartree self-consistent-field equations are solved numerically to give their energy eigenvalues and eigenfunctions. Both isotopes ⁴He and ³He are treated according to their bosonic and fermionic statistics and symmetry requirements. Clusters of all sizes of ⁴He atoms are stable, but there is a minimum threshold of ～70 atoms for the formation of ³He clusters. All the excited states in addition to the ground state were found. The wave functions are seen to have interesting differences from electronic wave functions in atoms.     

Heterogeneous hole nucleation in electron-charged 4He wetting films

4He wetting layers on Cs exhibit an unusually long-lived metastable state upon undercooling to temperatures well below the wetting temperature T(w) approximately 1.9 K. The decay of this state by homogeneous thermal nucleation of holes is disfavored by the incipient divergence of the free energy barrier separating the metastable thick film from the stable thin-film state. We propose that interface deformations ("dimples") created by electrons bound at the 4He liquid-vapor interface can be used as nuclei for the heterogeneous nucleation of holes. The size and excess free energy of the dimple can be tuned by an applied electric field E which allows the lifetime of the metastable film to be controlled.     

Magneto-optical trapping of Stark-slowed metastable He atoms

We report on the first successful loading of a magneto-optical trap (MOT) with metastable He atoms from a Stark-slower. Thereby, deceleration of the atoms relies on laser-atom interaction in an inhomogeneous electric field. We show that the results obtained are comparable with early results from other groups achieved with a Zeeman slower. The Stark slower, which is able to fully control the final velocity of the atomic He beam, is the first step in achieving complete spin independent kinematic control based solely on electric fields. Received 2 October 2002 / Received in final form 20 January 2003 Published online 29 April 2003 RID="a" ID="a"e-mail: eichmann@mbi-berlin.de     

Atomic and molecular defects in solid He

The studies of defects formed by impurity particles (atoms, molecules, exciplexes, clusters, free electrons, and positive ions) embedded in liquid and solid ⁴He are reviewed. The properties of free electrons and neutral particles in condensed helium are described by the electron (atomic) bubble model, whereas for the positive ions a snowball structure is considered. We compare the properties of the defects in condensed helium with those of metal atoms isolated in heavier rare gas matrices.     

Atomic impact experiments with free helium-3 and helium-4 clusters

Free helium clusters with of the order of 10³ to 10⁷ atoms have been predicted to reach final temperatures of about 0.4 K in the case of⁴He, and of 0.15 K in the case of³He. In the first case, the clusters have to be expected to be superfluid, in the latter case to be normalfluid. Impact experiments with cesium atoms, which are calculated to be strongly repelled from inside liquid⁴He, and slightly from liquid³He, indicate cesium embedding into or onto⁴He clusters. Xenon atoms, calculated to be strongly bound to both quantum liquids, show incomplete momentum transfer to⁴He as well as to³He clusters at higher impact speeds.     

Discovery of dumbbell-shaped Cs*Hen exciplexes in solid 4He

We have observed several new spectral features in the fluorescence of cesium atoms implanted in the hcp phase of solid helium following laser excitation to the 62P states. Based on calculations of the emission spectra using semiempirical Cs-He pair potentials the newly discovered lines can be assigned to the decay of specific Cs*Hen exciplexes: an apple-shaped Cs(APi3/2)He2 and a dumbbell-shaped Cs(APi1/2)Hen exciplex with a well-defined number n of bound helium atoms. While the former has been observed in other environments, it was commonly believed that exciplexes with n>2 might not exist. The calculations suggest Cs(APi1/2)He7 to be the most probable candidate for that exciplex, in which the helium atoms are arranged on a ring around the waist of the dumbbell-shaped electronic density distribution of the cesium atom.