Observation of two-zone Ramsey fringes using laser Stark spectroscopy of a molecular beam

Well-resolved Ramsey fringes have been demonstrated using laser Stark spectroscopy of CH₃F in a molecular beam with two interaction regions. Fringe separations as low as 155 kHz were obtained. The interaction regions were produced by masks containing slits placed in the Gaussian-profile beam of a cw CO₂ laser. Population inversion resulting from a frequency sweep associated with the curvature of the slit-diffracted wave fronts has limited the observations at high laser-power values. An imaging system has been shown to eliminate this effect. Experiments with three and five laser-molecular beam crossings were also conducted to demonstrate the feasibility of using multiple interaction regions as a tool for high-resolution spectroscopy. The results have been modeled using the optical Bloch equation for a two-level system. Good agreement with the experiment has been obtained.