Determination of the 87Rb 5p state dipole matrix element and radiative lifetime from the photoassociation spectroscopy of the Rb2 0g-(P3/2) long-range state -: art. no. 024502

We present a detailed study of the 0(g)(-)(P-3/2) pure long-range electronic state of the Rb-87(2) molecule. The high-resolution spectral data provided by photoassociative spectroscopy of Rb-87(2) is analyzed by using the generalized simulated annealing method. The dipole matrix element of the 5p Rb-87 atomic state and other effective asymptotic parameters for the 0(g)(-)(P-3/2) long-range state are determined and a complete analytical description of the potential well is obtained. We extract a radiative lifetime of the 5P(3/2) and 5P(1/2) states equal to 26.25(8) ns and 27.75(8) ns, respectively, with a precision (0.3%) comparable to atomic physics experiment.