Abstract
The thermal friction force acting on an atom moving relative to a thermal photon bath is known to be proportional to an integral over the imaginary part of the frequency-dependent atomic (dipole) polarizability. using a numerical approach, we find that blackbody friction on atoms either in dilute environments or in hot ovens is larger than previously thought by orders of magnitude. This enhancement is due to far off-resonant driving of transitions by low-frequency thermal radiation. at typical temperatures, the blackbody radiation maximum lies far below the atomic transition wavelengths. Surprisingly, due to the finite lifetime of atomic levels, which gives rise to Lorentzian line profiles, far off-resonant excitation leads to the dominant contribution for blackbody friction. © 2012 American Physical Society.
Recommended Citation
G. Łach et al., "Enhancement of Blackbody Friction Due to the Finite Lifetime of Atomic Levels," Physical Review Letters, vol. 108, no. 4, article no. 043005, American Physical Society, Jan 2012.
The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.043005
Department(s)
Physics
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)
1079-7114; 0031-9007
Document Type
Article - Journal
Document Version
Citation
File Type
text
Language(s)
English
Rights
© 2024 American Physical Society, All rights reserved.
Publication Date
24 Jan 2012
Comments
National Science Foundation, Grant 1068547