The van der Waals Potential between Metastable Atoms and Solid Surfaces: Novel Diffraction Experiments versus Theory

Ruediger Bruehl, Peter Fouquet, Robert E. Grisenti +5

Highly polarizable metastable He* ($2^3\mathrm{S}$) and Ne* ($2^3\mathrm{P}$) atoms have been diffracted from a 100 nm period silicon nitride transmission grating and the van der W…