Hannover 2013 – scientific programme

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MO: Fachverband Molekülphysik

MO 19: Poster 2: Biomolecules, Cold Molecules, Experimental Techniques, Various Topics

MO 19.7: Poster

Wednesday, March 20, 2013, 16:00–18:30, Empore Lichthof

Sisyphus Cooling of Electrically Trapped Polyatomic Molecules — •Rosa Glöckner, Barbara G.U. Englert, Alexander Prehn, Martin Ibrügger, Martin Zeppenfeld, and Gerhard Rempe — Max-Planck-Institut für Quantenoptik, Hans-Kopfermann-Str. 1, 85748 Garching, Germany

Developing methods to prepare cold and ultracold molecular ensembles would enable fundamental studies, ranging from many-body physics and quantum information to quantum controlled collisions and chemistry. However, a direct cooling mechanism for polar molecules with the capability to cool to the ultracold regime has long times seemed infeasible. Here we report on the experimental demonstration of opto-electrical cooling, a Sisyphus-type cooling scheme[1,2]. Fluoromethane molecules are cooled by more than one order of magnitude in temperature with an increase of phase space density by a factor of 30, demonstrating the potential of this scheme. The opto-electrical cooling scheme proceeds in an electric trap [3], and requires only a single infrared laser with additional RF and microwave fields. The cooling cycle depends on generic properties of polar molecules and can thus be extended to a wide range of molecule species. With the ongoing improvements we expect our method to allow cooling to sub-mK temperatures, opening wide-ranging opportunities for fundamental studies with polyatomic molecules at ultracold temperatures.

[1] M. Zeppenfeld et. al., Phys. Rev. A 80, 041401 (2009).
[2] M. Zeppenfeld et al., Nature 491, 570-573 (2012).
[3] B.G.U. Englert et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 107, 263003 (2011).