Figure 1

The measured field-free alignment of argon dimer for (a) one and (b) three revival periods. The insets show the typical angular distributions of the argon dimers for the alignment (labeled as A) and anti-alignment (labeled as B) cases around the half-revival period. The pump pulse is polarized in the $z$ direction and the probe pulse is circularly polarized in the $y$-$z$ plane.Reuse & Permissions

Figure 2

(a) The rotational state populations of the argon dimer obtained by Fourier transforming the measured time-dependent revival structures into the frequency domain. (b) The simulated revival structure of the argon dimer, and (c) the corresponding rotational state populations. Here, since the angular distribution is averaged over the θ angle with respect to the pump pulse polarization rather than the Φ angle, the isotropic orientation accounts for $\langle$cos${}^2$θ$\rangle =$ 1/3.Reuse & Permissions

Figure 3

(a) The count ratio between the alignment and anti-alignment cases for the Ar(1,1) channel. The circular (red) spots show the corresponding mean value. The two higher KER peaks show significantly stronger alignment dependences than the low energy peak. (b) The KER distribution of the Ar(1,1) channel for linearly polarized light. (c) The alignment dependent yield of the bond-softening induced dissociation of the argon dimer (peaked at ∼1.17 eV as shown in the inset without coincident condition). The red-solid curve shows the multiple Gaussian peaks fit of the measured data. Both the pump and probe pulses are linearly polarized along the $z$ direction.Reuse & Permissions