Polaritonic ultracold reactions: cavity controlled molecular photoassociation
Abstract
We introduce a prototypical model for cavity polaritonic control of ultracold photochemistry by considering the resonant vibrational strong coupling of a rubidium dimer to a terahertz cavity. We demonstrate that at avoided crossings between a vibrational excitation and the vacuum photon absorption, the resulting polaritonic states between the molecule and photons can efficiently control the molecular vibrational Franck-Condon (FC) factors. Due to the entanglement between light and matter, FC factor is transferred from one polaritonic branch to other, leading to a polariton with a substantially enhanced FC factor. Utilizing this polariton state for photoassociation results in the enhanced formation of ultracold molecules. This work suggests a path to controlling photoassociation with cavity vacuum fields, and lays the ground for the emerging subfield of polaritonic ultracold chemistry.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2311.02497,
title = {Polaritonic ultracold reactions: cavity controlled molecular photoassociation},
author = {Vasil Rokaj and Simeon I. Mistakidis and H. R. Sadeghpour},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2311.02497},
year = {2023}
}