Key points are not available for this paper at this time.
We have obtained spectra of the high-lying vibrational levels of the 1^3₆^+ state of ^6Li₂ via photoassociation of ultracold ^6Li atoms confined in a magneto-optical trap. The 1^3₆^+ state of the diatomic molecule correlates to a 2S₁/₂ state atom plus a 2P₁/₂ state atom. The long-range part of the molecular interaction potential for this state depends on the 2P atomic radiative lifetime. By calculating the energy eigenvalues of a model potential for the 1^3₆^+ state and fitting them to the experimentally measured vibrational levels, we have extracted a value for the 2P lifetime of 26. 990. 16 ns. The precision is currently limited by the accuracy of a region of the model potential provided by ab initio calculations.
McAlexander et al. (Wed,) studied this question.