Cold atoms photoassociation with intense laser pulses

We study the vibrational dynamics produced when two cold atoms are photoassociated in a diatomic molecule by an intense laser pulse (with the duration of hundreds ps), inducing a resonance condition at small interatomic distances. The example analysed is the population transfer from the continuum to the 1_g(6s + 6p_3/2) excited electronic potential of the Cs₂ molecule, at a temperature T ≈ 0.11 mK. We use a non-perturbative treatment by following the wavepackets dynamics on the ground and excited surfaces. We show that cold molecules can be efficiently produced in both ground and excited electronic potentials.