title: Ab initio study of low-lying triplet states of the lithium dimer.
abstract: Observation of Bose-Einstein condensation in Li27 initiated the interest in the scattering length of two ground state lithium atoms when they approach each other as a radical pair triplet aSigmau+3 state. But some properties of this state are still unknown. In present work, a number of low-lying triplet states of lithium molecule are calculated by multi-configuration self-consistent field (MCSCF) and response techniques with account of spin-orbit coupling, spin-spin coupling and some other magnetic perturbations. The singlet-triplet transition probabilities to the ground state are also presented. Most results are connected with the weakly bound lowest triplet a3Sigmau+ state, whose radiative lifetime and spin-splitting are unknown so far in spite of its great importance in Bose-Einstein condensation. Calculations indicate that this state has a very small spin-splitting, lambdass=-0.01 cm-1, which is negligible in comparison with the line-width in experimental Fourier transform spectra published so far. Similar splitting is obtained for the upper state of the 1(3)Sigmag+--a3Sigmau+ transition. This is in agreement with experimental rovibronic analysis of the 1(3)Sigmag+--a3Sigmau+ band system in which the triplet structure was not resolved. The radiative lifetime of the a3Sigmau+ state is predicted to exceed 10 h.
authors.affiliation: State University of Technology, Cherkassy 18006, Ukraine. boris@theochem.kth.se
authors.forename: Boris
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Minaev
mesh_terms: D019281:Dimerization; D004578:Electron Spin Resonance Spectroscopy; D004583:Electrons; D004735:Energy Transfer; D008094:Lithium / Q000737:chemistry*; D008956:Models, Chemical; D013113:Spin Labels
chemical_list: D013113:Spin Labels; D008094:Lithium