Abstract

We present experimental and theoretical studies of coherent excitation of magnetic sublevels in nD states of cesium that cross in an external electric field. Coherent excitation of m_F magnetic sublevels of hyperfine F levels with Δm_F = ±2 leads to resonances in the linearly polarized laser induced fluorescence (LIF), while coherent excitation of magnetic sublevels with Δm_F = ±1 leads to alignment to orientation conversion (AOC). From the resonance signals we were able to measure atomic constants, such as the hyperfine constant A and the tensor polarizability α₂ [1]. AOC involves the deformation of the spatial distribution of an atom's angular momentum and is of interest as a background in certain types of experiments that search for a permanent electric dipole moment (EDM) of the electron [2].

© 2007 IEEE