Related papers: Producing translationally cold, ground-state CO mo…
We report continuous direct photoassociative formation of ultracold KRb molecules in the lowest vibrational levels $(v"=0 -10)$ of the electronic ground state $(X ^1\Sigma^+)$, starting from $^{39}$K and $^{85}$Rb atoms in a magneto-optical…
We demonstrate a new spectroscopic method for studying electronic transitions in molecules with extremely broad range of angular momentum. We employ an optical centrifuge to create narrow rotational wave packets in the ground electronic…
Recent experiments have demonstrated direct cooling and trapping of diatomic and triatomic molecules in magneto-optical traps (MOTs). However, even the best molecular MOTs to date still have density $10^{-5}$ times smaller than in typical…
HOCO$^+$ is a polar molecule that represents a useful proxy for its parent molecule CO$_2$, which is not directly observable in the cold interstellar medium. This cation has been detected towards several lines of sight, including massive…
Chemical reactions typically proceed via stochastic encounters between reactants. Going beyond this paradigm, we combine exactly two atoms into a single, controlled reaction. The experimental apparatus traps two individual laser-cooled…
We propose an array of ultracold polar molecules as a platform to study alignment transport between molecules. We envision a polar molecule being aligned with an intense off-resonant laser field whose alignment migrates to a nearby molecule…
We have trapped cesium atoms over many minutes in the focus of a CO$_2$-laser beam employing an extremely simple laser system. Collisional properties of the unpolarized atoms in their electronic ground state are investigated. Inelastic…
We demonstrate rotational cooling of the silicon monoxide cation via optical pumping by a spectrally filtered broadband laser. Compared with diatomic hydrides, SiO\+ is more challenging to cool because of its smaller rotational interval.…
We report on the electrostatic trapping of neutral SrF molecules. The molecules are captured from a cryogenic buffer-gas beam source into the moving traps of a 4.5 m long traveling-wave Stark decelerator. The SrF molecules in…
We report a lithographic process for creating high-resolution (<10 nm) carbon templates on Si(100). A scanning electron microscope, operating under low vacuum (10E-6 mbar), produces a carbon-containing deposit ("contamination resist") on…
The large electric dipole moments associated with highly excited Rydberg states of atoms and molecules make gas-phase samples in these states very well suited to deceleration and trapping using inhomogeneous electric fields. The methods of…
Trapping ultracold molecules in conservative traps is essential for applications -- such as quantum state-controlled chemistry, quantum simulations, and quantum information processing. These applications require high densities or…
The ability to cool atoms below the Doppler limit -- the minimum temperature reachable by Doppler cooling -- has been essential to most experiments with quantum degenerate gases, optical lattices and atomic fountains, among many other…
We propose a highly efficient and fast method of translational cooling for high-angular-momentum atoms. Optical pumping and stimulated transitions, combined with magnetic forces, can be used to compress phase-space density, and the…
A one-dimensional (1D) Bose system with dipole-dipole repulsion is studied at zero temperature by means of a Quantum Monte Carlo method. It is shown that in the limit of small linear density the bosonic system of dipole moments acquires…
The Stark interaction of polar molecules with an inhomogeneous electric field is exploited to select slow molecules from a room-temperature reservoir and guide them into an ultrahigh vacuum chamber. A linear electrostatic quadrupole with a…
It is shown that the translational degrees of freedom of a large variety of molecules, from light diatomic to heavy organic ones, can be cooled sympathetically and brought to rest (crystallized) in a linear Paul trap. The method relies on…
The use of pressure to obtain new materials that can be recovered under ambient conditions is a central problem in high-pressure physics. Despite decades of research, this goal has only been achieved in the laboratory for a few notable…
We report on the creation of ultracold 84Sr2 molecules in the electronic ground state. The molecules are formed from atom pairs on sites of an optical lattice using stimulated Raman adiabatic passage (STIRAP). We achieve a transfer…
Complex Organic Molecules (COMs) are believed to form in the ice mantle of dust grains and are released to the gas by thermal sublimation when grain mantles are heated to temperatures of $T_{\rm d}\gtrsim 100\,\rm K$. However, some COMs are…