Ultracold collisions of metastable helium atoms

P. J. Leo, V. Venturi, I. B. Whittingham, J. F. Babb

Published 2000-11-29, updated 2001-06-27Version 2

We report scattering lengths for the singlet Sigma g +, triplet Sigma u + and quintet Sigma g + adiabatic molecular potentials relevant to collisions of two metastable (n=2 triplet S) helium atoms as a function of the uncertainty in these potentials. These scattering lengths are used to calculate experimentally observable scattering lengths, elastic cross sections and inelastic rates for any combination of states of the colliding atoms, at temperatures where the Wigner threshold approximation is valid.