The diatomic molecule radium monofluoride (RaF) has recently been proposed as a versatile probe for physics beyond the current standard model. Herein, a route towards production of a RaF molecular beam via radium ions is proposed. It takes advantage
of the special electronic structure expected for group 2 halides and group 2 hydrides: The electronic ground state of neutral RaF and its monocation differ in occupation of a non-bonding orbital of $sigma$ symmetry. This implies similar equilibrium distances and harmonic vibrational wavenumbers in the two charge states and thus favourable Franck--Condon factors for neutralisation without dissociation in neutralising collisions. According to the calculated ionisation energy of RaF, charge exchange collisions of RaF$^+$ with sodium atoms are almost iso-enthalpic, resulting in large cross-sections for the production of neutral radium monofluoride.
The parameter $W_mathrm{a}$, which characterizes nuclear spin-dependent parity violation effects within the effective molecular spin-rotational Hamiltonian, was computed for the electronic ground state of radium fluoride (RaF) and found to be one of
the largest absolute values predicted so far. These calculations were performed with the complex generalised Hartree-Fock method within a two-component (quasi-relativistic) zeroth-order regular approximation framework. Peculiarities of the molecular electronic structure of RaF lead to highly diagonal Franck-Condon matrices between vibrational states of the electronic ground and first excited states, which renders the molecule in principle suitable for direct laser cooling. As a trapped gas of cold molecules offers a superior coherence time, RaF can be considered a promising candidate for high-precision spectroscopic experiments aimed at the search of molecular parity-violation effects.
