Dynamical quenching of tunneling in molecular magnets

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that rapidly oscillating magnetic fields can suppress tunneling in molecular magnets, enabling control of their quantum states through terahertz radiation, with theoretical and numerical validation.

Contribution

It introduces a novel mechanism for quenching tunneling in molecular magnets using high-frequency magnetic fields, distinct from coherent destruction of tunneling, supported by an effective theory and numerical evidence.

Findings

Tunneling can be suppressed by oscillating magnetic fields.

The effective theory describes slow dynamics with quenched tunneling.

Numerical solutions confirm the theoretical predictions.

Abstract

It is shown that a single molecular magnet placed in a rapidly oscillating magnetic field displays the phenomenon of quenching of tunneling processes. The results open a way to manipulate the quantum states of molecular magnets by means of radiation in the terahertz range. Our analysis separates the time evolution into slow and fast components thereby obtaining an effective theory for the slow dynamics. This effective theory presents quenching of the tunnel effect. In particular, stands out its difference with the so-called coherent destruction of tunneling. We support our prediction with numerical evidence based on an exact solution of the Schr\"odinger's equation.