Forming a Single Molecule by Magnetoassociation in an Optical Tweezer

Jessie T Zhang; Yichao Yu; William B Cairncross; Kenneth Wang; Lewis R B Picard; Jonathan D Hood; Yen-Wei Lin; Jeremy M Hutson; Kang-Kuen Ni

doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.124.253401

Forming a Single Molecule by Magnetoassociation in an Optical Tweezer

Phys Rev Lett. 2020 Jun 26;124(25):253401. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.124.253401.

Authors

Jessie T Zhang^{1

2

3}, Yichao Yu^{1

2

3}, William B Cairncross^{1

2

3}, Kenneth Wang^{1

2

3}, Lewis R B Picard^{1

2

3}, Jonathan D Hood^{2

3}, Yen-Wei Lin^{2

3}, Jeremy M Hutson⁴, Kang-Kuen Ni^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA.
² Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA.
³ Harvard-MIT Center for Ultracold Atoms, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA.
⁴ Joint Quantum Centre Durham-Newcastle, Department of Chemistry, Durham University, Durham DH1 3LE, United Kingdom.

PMID: 32639768
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.124.253401

Abstract

We demonstrate the formation of a single NaCs molecule in an optical tweezer by magnetoassociation through an s-wave Feshbach resonance at 864.11(5) G. Starting from single atoms cooled to their motional ground states, we achieve conversion efficiencies of 47(1)%, and measure a molecular lifetime of 4.7(7) ms. By construction, the single molecules are predominantly [77(5)%] in the center-of-mass motional ground state of the tweezer. Furthermore, we produce a single p-wave molecule near 807 G by first preparing one of the atoms with one quantum of motional excitation. Our creation of a single weakly bound molecule in a designated internal state in the motional ground state of an optical tweezer is a crucial step towards coherent control of single molecules in optical tweezer arrays.