An optical tweezer array of ultracold molecules

Loïc Anderegg; Lawrence W Cheuk; Yicheng Bao; Sean Burchesky; Wolfgang Ketterle; Kang-Kuen Ni; John M Doyle

doi:10.1126/science.aax1265

An optical tweezer array of ultracold molecules

Science. 2019 Sep 13;365(6458):1156-1158. doi: 10.1126/science.aax1265.

Authors

Loïc Anderegg^{1

2}, Lawrence W Cheuk^{3

2}, Yicheng Bao^{3

2}, Sean Burchesky^{3

2}, Wolfgang Ketterle^{2

4}, Kang-Kuen Ni^{3

2

5}, John M Doyle^{3

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA. anderegg@g.harvard.edu.
² Harvard-MIT Center for Ultracold Atoms, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
³ Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
⁴ Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
⁵ Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.

PMID: 31515390
DOI: 10.1126/science.aax1265

Abstract

Ultracold molecules have important applications that range from quantum simulation and computation to precision measurements probing physics beyond the Standard Model. Optical tweezer arrays of laser-cooled molecules, which allow control of individual particles, offer a platform for realizing this full potential. In this work, we report on creating an optical tweezer array of laser-cooled calcium monofluoride molecules. This platform has also allowed us to observe ground-state collisions of laser-cooled molecules both in the presence and absence of near-resonant light.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.