Coherent transfer of photoassociated molecules into the rovibrational ground state

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a method to produce ultracold molecules in their ground state from laser-cooled atoms using photoassociation and stimulated Raman transfer, revealing hyperfine structures and enabling coherent molecular control.

Contribution

It introduces an all-optical technique for creating rovibrationally pure ultracold molecules and explores their hyperfine structure with high-resolution spectroscopy.

Findings

Successful transfer of molecules into the rovibrational ground state

Revealed hyperfine structure of weakly bound molecules

Achieved a pure ultracold molecular sample

Abstract

We report on the direct conversion of laser-cooled 41K and 87Rb atoms into ultracold 41K87Rb molecules in the rovibrational ground state via photoassociation followed by stimulated Raman adiabatic passage. High-resolution spectroscopy based on the coherent transfer revealed the hyperfine structure of weakly bound molecules in an unexplored region. Our results show that a rovibrationally pure sample of ultracold ground-state molecules is achieved via the all-optical association of laser-cooled atoms, opening possibilities to coherently manipulate a wide variety of molecules.