Seminar: Tijs Karman (Radboud University); Wed 3 November (3pm tbc)

Last updated November 29, 2021 by Dermot Green

Location: MS Teams

Shielding ultracold molecules with microwaves

Ultracold molecules are used for precision measurements, to explore chemistry in a coherent quantum mechanical regime, and applications in quantum technologies. Realizing these wide-ranging applications will require control of interactions between molecules.

In this talk, I will discuss how we can use microwaves to engineer repulsive long-range interactions between ultracold polar molecules [1].
The repulsive interactions prevent molecules from coming close together and thereby suppresses various loss mechanisms. At the same time, “microwave shielding” leads to large elastic cross sections required for thermalization and evaporative cooling — an elusive milestone in the field.

I will also discuss the first experimental realization of microwave shielding using cold CaF molecules trapped in optical tweezers [2], demonstrating a factor of six suppression of the inelastic loss.

[1] Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 163401 (2018)
[2] Science 373, 779 (2021)

About CTAMOP:

We are a Research Cluster of the School of Mathematics and Physics at Queen’s University Belfast in Northern Ireland. Our research interests are focused primarily on computational and theoretical physics.

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