Population transfer through multiple channels in two harmonic laser pulses

The processes of population transfer in the ground electronic state of HCl molecule through the three transition schemes are investigated by numerically solving the time-dependent Schrödinger equation. Two harmonic pulses are employed to induce population transfer and the relative phase of the two pulses can control the final population distributions. In the ladder transition scheme, the variation range of the target population with the relative phase is nearly 100% which is larger than that in the multi-photon transition scheme. It is more efficient for the mixed transition scheme to control population transfer between the initial and target states by using the relative phase. Comparing with the multi-photon and ladder schemes, the transition probability of the target population is more sensitive to the two pulse amplitudes in the mixed transition scheme.