Trapping Neutral Mercury

Properties of Mercury

Some properties of mercury relevant to cooling and trapping
Properties
Vapor pressure	1.68 10^-8 at 208 K
average velocity	146.6 m/s
most likely velocity	129.9 m/s
cooling transition	³P₁ <- ¹S₀	³D₃ <- ³P₂
cooling wavelength	253.7 nm	365.0 nm
average number of photons for cooling	17 000	24 000
life time of upper cooling state	125 ns	7.8 ns
Doppler temperature	30 microK	490 microK
Doppler limited speed	7.8 mm/s	5.5 mm/s
Saturation Intensity	10 mW/cm	55 mW/cm

Level scheme of Mercury with relevant transitions shown.

Relative position of the transition for the various bosonic and fermionic isotopes. The line height reflects the natural abundance of the various isotopes.