Radial Rydberg wavepacket maps

Picosecond laser pulses have been used to excite radial Rydberg wavepackets in Ca. Time-delayed, unipolar, 'half-cycle' electric field pulses are used to probe the evolution of the wavepackets as a continuous function of bind ing energy. The data provide three-dimensional maps of wavepacket recurrenc e probability versus binding energy versus time. A rescaling of the energy and time coordinate axes allows the visualization of the distinct differenc e between the initial oscillations of the wavepacket and those that occur a t integer and fractional revivals.