Laser cooling of atoms and the study of ultracold atomic collisions

We present an overview of recent experiments we have done concerning the observation of photoassociative ionization in a cold sample of trapped sodium atoms. In a second stage, the process is used as a prototype to demonstrate the possibility of optical manipulation of interatomic collisions. This effect could be explored to manipulate the thermodynamical properties of a sample of degenerated quantum gas.© (1999) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.