Abstract
Chirality causes symmetry breaks in a large variety of natural phenomena ranging from particlephysics to biochemistry. We investigate one of the simplest conceivable chiral systems, a laser-excited, oriented, effective one-electron Li target. Prepared in a polarized p state with |m|= 1 in an optical trap, the atoms are exposed to co- and counterrotating circularly polarized femtosecond laser pulses. For a field frequency near the excitation energy of the oriented initial state, a strongcircular dichroism is observed and the photoelectron energies are significantly affected by the helicity-dependent Autler-Townes splitting. Besides its fundamental relevance, this system is suited to create spin-polarized electron pulses with a reversible switch on a femtosecond timescale at an energy resolution of a few meV.
Recommended Citation
A. H. De Silva et al., "Using Circular Dichroism to Control Energy Transfer in Multiphoton Ionization," Physical Review Letters, vol. 126, no. 2, article no. 23201, American Physical Society (APS), Jan 2021.
The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.126.023201
Department(s)
Physics
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)
0031-9007; PHY--090031
Document Type
Article - Journal
Document Version
Final Version
File Type
text
Language(s)
English
Rights
© 2021 American Physical Society (APS), All rights reserved.
Publication Date
12 Jan 2021
PubMed ID
33512178
Comments
The experimental material presented here is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. PHY-1554776.