Atomic & Molecular Physics
JILA Fellow Ana Maria Rey has been named a finalist for the prestigious Blavatnik Award for Young Scientists.
JILA Fellow Murray Holland was recognized for his outstanding teaching skills this spring.
Dr. Thomas Perkins won a Gears of Government Award for his work in atomic force microscopy.
Trapping single atoms is a bit like herding cats, which makes researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder expert feline wranglers. In a new study, a team led by physicist Cindy Regal showed that it could load groups of individual atoms into large grids with an efficiency unmatched by existing methods.
When the Ye group measured the total quantum state of buckyballs, we learned that this large molecule can play by full quantum rules. Specifically, this measurement resolved the rotational states of the buckyball, making it the largest and most complex molecule to be understood at this level.
JILA researchers have, for the first time, trapped a single alkaline-earth atom and cooled it to its ground state. To trap this atom, researchers used an optical tweezer, which is a laser focused to a pinpoint that can hold, move and manipulate atoms. The full motional and electronic control wielded by this tool enables microscopically precise studies of the limiting factors in many of today’s forefront physics experiments, especially quantum information science and metrology.
JILA researchers have created the first quantum degenerate gas of polar molecules. This new form of matter has been a decade-long goal of molecular chemistry. This achievement will allow researchers to better understand the role of quantum physics in chemical reactions, and could make molecules a potential candidate for quantum information storage or precision measurement tools.
Microwaves report on the direction of a magnetic field! Our work on self-calibrated atomic vector magnetometry has been published in Phys. Rev. Lett. We show that a microwave polarization ellipse can be mapped with atomic transitions, and can serve as a useful three-dimensional reference. Our next step is to translate this idea to atomic vapor cells to make an atomic vector magnetometer that can calibrate itself at any time.
In the vast stretches between solar systems, heat does not flow and sound does not exist. Action seems to stop, but only if you don’t look long enough. Violent and chaotic actions occur in the long stretches of outer space. These chemical reactions between radicals and ions are the same reactions underlying the burn of a flame and floating the ozone above our planet. But they’re easy to miss in outer space because they’re very rare.
The chaos within a black hole scrambles information. Gravity tugs on time in tiny, discrete steps. A phantom-like presence pervades our universe, yet evades detection. These intangible phenomena may seem like mere conjectures of science fiction, but in reality, experimental comprehension is not far, in neither time nor space. Astronomical advances in quantum simulators and quantum sensors will likely be made within the decade, and the leading experiments for black holes, gravitons, and dark matter will be not in space, but in basements – sitting on tables, in a black room lit only by lasers.