Related papers: Low-energy collisions between carbon atoms and oxy…
Collisions between cold molecules are essential for studying fundamental aspects of quantum chemistry, and may enable formation of quantum degenerate molecular matter by evaporative cooling. However, collisions between trapped, naturally…
Collision cross sections and rate constants between two ground- state oxygen molecules are investigated theoretically at translational energies below $\sim 1$K and in zero magnetic field. We present calculations for elastic and spin-…
Measurements of interactions between cold molecules and ultracold atoms can allow for a detailed understanding of fundamental collision processes. These measurements can be done using various experimental geometries including where both…
We demonstrate simultaneous deceleration and trapping of a cold atomic and molecular mixture. This is the first step towards studies of cold atom-molecule collisions at low temperatures as well as application of sympathetic cooling. Both…
Cold, neutral hydroxyl radicals are Stark decelerated and confined within a magnetic trap consisting of two permanent ring magnets. The OH molecules are trapped in the ro-vibrational ground state at a density of $\sim10^{6}$ cm$^{-3}$ and…
Ultra-cold RbCs molecules in high-lying vibrational levels of the a$^3\Sigma^+$ ground electronic state are confined in an optical trap. Inelastic collision rates of these molecules with both Rb and Cs atoms are determined for individual…
Interactions between cold ions and atoms have been proposed for use in implementing quantum gates\cite{Idziaszek2007}, probing quantum gases\cite{Sherkunov2009}, observing novel charge-transport dynamics\cite{Cote2000}, and sympathetically…
We present the first experimental observation of cold collisions between two different species of neutral polar molecules, each prepared in a single internal quantum state. Combining for the first time the techniques of Stark deceleration,…
We have experimentally explored a novel possibility to study exoergic cold atomic collisions. Trapping of small countable atom numbers in a shallow magneto-optical trap and monitoring of their temporal dynamics allows us to directly observe…
Ion-atom interactions are a comparatively recent field of research that has drawn considerable attention due to its applications in areas including quantum chemistry and quantum simulations. In first experiments, atomic ions and neutral…
Understanding collisions between ultracold molecules is crucial for making stable molecular quantum gases and harnessing their rich internal degrees of freedom for quantum engineering. Transient complexes can strongly influence collisional…
We consider collisions of electric and magnetic polar molecules, taking the OH radical as an example, subject to combined electric and magnetic static fields. We show that the relative orientation of the fields has an important effect on…
We present an experimental and theoretical study of atom-molecule collisions in a mixture of cold, trapped atomic nitrogen and NH molecules at a temperature of $\sim 600$~mK. We measure a small N+NH trap loss rate coefficient of…
We present the first simultaneous trapping of two different ultracold atomic species in a conservative trap. Lithium and cesium atoms are stored in an optical dipole trap formed by the focus of a CO$_2$ laser. Techniques for loading both…
We report the magnetic confinement of neutral, ground state hydroxyl radicals (OH) at a density of $\sim3\times10^{3}$ cm$^{-3}$ and temperature of $\sim$30 mK. An adjustable electric field of sufficient magnitude to polarize the OH is…
Ultracold dysprosium gases, with a magnetic moment ten times that of alkali atoms and equal only to terbium as the most magnetic atom, are expected to exhibit a multitude of fascinating collisional dynamics and quantum dipolar phases,…
Isolating neutral and charged particles from the environment is essential in precision experiments. For decades, this has been achieved by trapping ions with radio-frequency (rf) fields and neutral particles with optical fields. Recently,…
We study the dynamics of atoms in optical traps when exposed to laser cooling light that induces light-assisted collisions. We experimentally prepare individual atom pairs and observe their evolution. Due to the simplicity of the system…
We consider how trapped molecules can be sympathetically cooled by ultracold atoms. As a prototypical system, we study LiH molecules co-trapped with ultracold Li atoms. We calculate the elastic and inelastic collision cross sections of LiH…
We demonstrate the long-term ($<$ 1 minute) trapping of Stark-decelerated OH radicals in their $X~^{2}\Pi _{3/2}~(\nu = 0,~J = 3/2,~M_{J} = 3/2,~f)$ state in a permanent magnetic trap. The trap environment was cryogenically cooled to a…