SCATTERING OF ATOMS IN THE FIELD OF COUNTERPROPAGATING LIGHT WAVES - EFFECT OF INITIAL CONDITIONS

The scattering of an atom in the field of counterpropagating light wav es is studied under conditions such that the state of the atom is a su perposition of the ground and excited states. For the case in which th is superposition is created by the field of a traveling wave, the mome ntum distribution function of the atom after scattering by a standing wave is found analytically in the approximation of a short interaction time, when the atom's motion can be neglected. Longer interactions of the atom with the field are studied numerically. We also consider the case of counterpropagating light waves consisting of Gaussian or supe rgaussian pulses. (C) 1998 American Institute of Physics.