Imaging the structure of the trimer systems 4He3 and 3He4He2

Voigtsberger, Jörg; Zeller, Stefan; Becht, Jasper; Neumann, Nadine; Sturm, Felix; Kim, Hong-Keun; Waitz, Markus; Trinter, Florian; Kunitski, Maksim; Kalinin, Anton; Wu, Jian; Schöllkopf, Wieland; Bressanini, Dario; Czasch, Achim; Williams, Joshua; Ullmann-Pfleger, Klaus; Schmidt, Lothar; Schöffler, Markus; Grisenti, Robert; Jahnke, Till; Dörner, Reinhard

doi:10.1038/ncomms6765

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Imaging the structure of the trimer systems ⁴He₃ and ³He⁴He₂

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Schöllkopf, Wieland
Molecular Physics, Fritz Haber Institute, Max Planck Society;

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Voigtsberger, J., Zeller, S., Becht, J., Neumann, N., Sturm, F., Kim, H.-K., et al. (2014). Imaging the structure of the trimer systems ⁴He₃ and ³He⁴He₂. Nature Communications, 5(12): 5765. doi:10.1038/ncomms6765.

Cite as: https://hdl.handle.net/11858/00-001M-0000-0024-32F0-7

Abstract

Helium shows fascinating quantum phenomena unseen in any other element. In its liquid phase, it is the only known superfluid. The smallest aggregates of helium, the dimer (He₂) and the trimer (He₃) are, in their predicted structure, unique natural quantum objects. While one might intuitively expect the structure of ⁴He₃ to be an equilateral triangle, a manifold of predictions on its shape have yielded an ongoing dispute for more than 20 years. These predictions range from ⁴He₃ being mainly linear to being mainly an equilateral triangle. Here we show experimental images of the wave functions of ⁴He₃ and ³He⁴He₂ obtained by Coulomb explosion imaging of mass-selected clusters. We propose that ⁴He₃ is a structureless random cloud and that ³He⁴He₂ exists as a quantum halo state.