Precise measurement of hyperfine structure in the $5P_{3/2}$ state of $^{85}$Rb

Rapol, Umakant D.; Krishna, Anusha; Natarajan, Vasant

Precise measurement of hyperfine structure in the $5P_{3/2}$ state of $^{85}$Rb

Authors

Rapol, Umakant D.

Krishna, Anusha

Natarajan, Vasant

Description

We demonstrate a technique to measure hyperfine structure using a frequency-stabilized diode laser and an acousto-optic modulator locked to the frequency difference between two hyperfine peaks. We use this technique to measure hyperfine intervals in the $5P_{3/2}$ state of $^{85}$Rb and obtain a precision of 20 kHz. We extract values for the magnetic-dipole coupling constant $A=25.038(5)$ MHz and the electric-quadrupole coupling constant $B=26.011(22)$ MHz. These values are a significant improvement over previous results.
4 pages, 4 figures