Impact of molecular properties on diffraction at nanomasks with low charge density

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that low-charge nanomasks enable diffraction of polar molecules with larger dipole moments, advancing the study of molecular structure via matter-wave experiments.

Contribution

The authors developed low-charge nanomasks using ion-beam milling, allowing diffraction of highly polar molecules, which was previously hindered by dispersive surface interactions.

Findings

Successful fabrication of low-charge nanomasks.

Diffraction of polar molecules with larger dipole moments observed.

Enhanced ability to study molecular structures in matter-wave experiments.

Abstract

The quantum wave nature of matter is a cornerstone of modern physics, which has been demonstrated for a wide range of fundamental and composite particles. While diffraction at nanomechanical masks is usually regarded to be independent of atomic or molecular internal states, the particles' polarisabilities and dipole moments lead to dispersive interactions with the grating surface. In prior experiments, such forces largely prevented matter-wave experiments with polar molecules, as they led to dephasing of the matter wave in the presence of randomly distributed charges incorporated into the grating. Here we show that ion-beam milling using neon facilitates the fabrication of lowly-charged nanomasks in gold-capped silicon nitride membranes. This allows us to observe the diffraction of polar molecules with a four times larger electric dipole moment than in previous experiments. This new capability opens a path to the assessment of the structure of polar molecules in matter-wave diffraction experiments.