Giant cross section for molecular ion formation in ultracold Rydberg gases

Understand

We have studied the associative ionization of a Rydberg atom and a ground state atom in an ultracold Rydberg gas.

• The measured scattering cross section is three orders of magnitude larger than the geometrical size of the produced molecule.
• This giant enhancement of the reaction kinetics is due to an efficient directed mass transport which is mediated by the Rydberg electron.
• We also find that the total inelastic scattering cross section is given by the geometrical size of the Rydberg electron's wavefunction.