Related papers: Slow decay processes of electrostatically trapped …
The double-resonant laser excitation of nitric oxide, cooled to 1 K in a seeded supersonic molecular beam, yields a gas of $\approx10^{12}$ molecules cm$^{-3}$ in a single selected Ryberg state. This population evolves to produce prompt…
We study the internal state dynamics of optically trapped polyatomic molecules subject to room temperature blackbody radiation. Using rate equations that account for radiative decay and blackbody excitation between rovibrational levels of…
We report on the production of a pulsed molecular beam of metastable NH ($a ^1\Delta$) radicals and present first results on the Stark deceleration of the NH ($a ^1\Delta, J=2, M\Omega=-4$) radicals from 550 m/s to 330 m/s. The decelerated…
We have demonstrated a new, accessible and economical technique, dubbed photostop, for producing high densities of trappable molecules. Direct measurements are presented of NO molecules produced with a narrow velocity distribution centered…
We demonstrate feedback control optimization for the Stark deceleration and trapping of neutral polar molecules using evolutionary strategies. In a Stark-decelerator beamline pulsed electric fields are used to decelerate OH radicals and…
We demonstrate the deceleration of heavy polar molecules in low-field seeking states by combining a cryogenic source and a travelling-wave Stark decelerator. The cryogenic source provides a high intensity beam with low speed and…
Optical pumping by blackbody radiation is a feature shared by all polar molecules and fundamentally limits the time that these molecules can be kept in a single quantum state in a trap. To demonstrate and quantify this, we have monitored…
We describe the production of cold, slow-moving LiH molecules. The molecules are produced in the ground state using laser ablation and supersonic expansion, and 68% of the population is transferred to the rotationally excited state using…
Stability achieved by large angular momentum is ubiquitous in nature, with examples ranging from classical mechanics, over optics and chemistry, to nuclear physics. In atoms, angular momentum can protect excited electronic orbitals from…
We present an experimental realization of a moving magnetic trap decelerator, where paramagnetic particles entrained in a cold supersonic beam are decelerated in a co-moving magnetic trap. Our method allows for an efficient slowing of both…
We report the measurement of ultrafast relaxation dynamics of excited states of carbon dioxide molecule using time-resolved pump-probe photoelectron spectroscopy. Neutral ground state carbon dioxide is excited to $nd\sigma_g$ Henning sharp…
Not long after metastable xenon was photoionized in a magneto-optical trap, groups in Europe and North America found that similar states of ionized gas evolved spontaneously from state-selected, high principal quantum number Rydberg gases.…
A new type of decelerator is presented where polar neutral molecules are guided and decelerated using the principle of traveling electric potential wells, such that molecules are confined in stable three-dimensional traps throughout. This…
Population dynamics in weakly-excited clouds of ultracold $^{87}$Rb Rydberg atoms were studied by means of trap loss, fluorescence detection, and state dependent stimulated emission. Rydberg atoms were excited to various nl Rydberg states…
Rydberg atoms are remarkable tools for quantum simulation and computation. They are the focus of an intense experimental activity mainly based on low-angular-momentum Rydberg states. Unfortunately, atomic motion and levels lifetime limit…
We theoretically investigate the quantum properties of nS, nP, and nD Rydberg atoms in a magnetic Ioffe-Pritchard trap. In particular, it is demonstrated that the two-body character of Rydberg atoms significantly alters the trapping…
We report here on the production of an ultracold gas of tightly bound Rb2 molecules in the ro-vibrational triplet ground state, close to quantum degeneracy. This is achieved by optically transferring weakly bound Rb2 molecules to the…
Recently, a decelerator for neutral polar molecules has been presented that operates on the basis of macroscopic, three-dimensional, traveling electrostatic traps (Osterwalder et al., Phys. Rev. A 81, 051401 (2010)). In the present paper, a…
We have measured the radiative lifetimes of ns, np and nd Rydberg states of rubidium in the range 28 < n < 45. To enable long-lived states to be measured, our experiment uses slow-moving Rb atoms in a magneto-optical trap (MOT). Two…
The study and quantification of UV photon-induced desorption of frozen molecules furthers our understanding of the chemical evolution of cold interstellar regions. Nitric oxide (NO) is an important intermediate species in both gas-phase and…