Laser cooled 137BaF molecules for measuring nuclear-spin-dependent parity violation

2025/01/27 by Felix Kogel, Kogel, Felix, Tatsam Garg +5 · 1 voice · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #physics.atom-ph #cond-mat.quant-gas #nucl-ex

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2501.16095

Abstract

We demonstrate optical cycling and transverse laser cooling of a beam of fermionic 137BaF molecules. Their high masses and nuclear spins make these molecules sensitive probes for parity violation and properties of the weak interaction. However, the nuclear spins also lead to a quasi-closed cycling transition currently involving up to 112 levels, which significantly exceeds the complexity in other laser-cooled molecules. Optical cycling and cooling are facilitated through carefully designed optical spectra tailored to this molecular structure. Our results pave the way for efficient state preparation, detection, and cooling in precision measurements using this species and other similar species.

Cited by

• Numerical modeling of laser cooling in molecules: From simple diatomics to polyatomics and radioactive species

Discussions

• Two levels are great for qubits, but molecules can take it to the next level—currently 112 of them, to be exact. We've controlled this complexity to realize laser cooling of previously intractable 13 [bsky, 11 points, 1 comments]

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