Cold interactions between an Yb? ion and a Li atom: Prospects for sympathetic cooling, radiative association, and Feshbach resonances.

Abstract

The electronic structure of the (LiYb)? molecular ion is investigated with two 
variants of the coupled cluster method restricted to single, double, and noniterative 
or linear triple excitations. Potential energy curves for the ground and excited 
states, permanent and transition electric dipole movements, and long-range interaction
coefficients C4 and C6 are reported. The data is subsequently employed in scattering 
calculations and photoassociation studies. Feshbach resonances are shown to be 
measurable despite the ion’s micromotion in the Paul trap. Molecular ions can be 
formed in their singlet electronic ground state by one-photon photoassociation and in
triplet states by two-photon photoassociation; and control of cold atom-ion chemistry 
based on Feshbach resonances should be feasible. Conditions for sympathetic cooling of
an Yb? ion by an ultracold gas of Li atoms are found to be favorable in the 
temperature range of 10 mK to 10 nK; and further improvements using Feshbach 
resonances should be possible. Overall, these results suggest excellent prospects for
building a quantum simulator with ultracold Yb? ions and Li atoms.