Two-photon photoassociation spectroscopy of heteronuclear YbRb

Abstract

We report on the spectroscopic investigation of vibrational levels in the electronic ground state of the heteronuclear molecule ¹⁷⁶Yb⁸⁷Rb. Using two-photon photoassociation spectroscopy in a laser-cooled mixture of ¹⁷⁶Yb and ⁸⁷Rb we are able to determine the binding energies of weakly-bound vibrational levels. By applying the LeRoy–Bernstein method we assign the vibrational quantum numbers and deduce a C₆ coefficient for the long-range part of the molecular potential of ∼2500 a.u.