Microscopic Rydberg electron orbit manipulation with optical tweezers

TL;DR

This paper proposes a method to manipulate Rydberg electron orbitals using focused laser beams, enabling precise control of electronic states and potential trapping at sub-orbital scales.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach for local manipulation of Rydberg electrons with optical tweezers, leading to strong state mixing and tunable dipole moments.

Findings

Strong Rydberg state mixing induced by focused laser beams.

High-bandwidth modulation of dipole moments through laser intensity control.

Potential for eccentric radial trapping of Rydberg electrons.

Abstract

Laser cooling and trapping of atomic matter waves in optical potentials has enabled rapid progress in quantum science, particularly when combined with Rydberg excitation of the atoms to induce long-range interactions. Here, we propose the local manipulation and spatio-temporal sculpting of the electronic matter wave of a Rydberg atom by a laser field focused so that its beam width is smaller than the Rydberg electron orbit. We compute the electronic eigenstates in the presence of a sharply focused Gaussian laser beam, and find strong Rydberg state mixing leading to large kilo-Debye dipole moments. These can be modulated with high bandwidth controlled by the local tweezer intensity. Oscillations in the position-dependent level shifts, analogous to the potential wells allowing ultralong-range Rydberg molecules to form, provide opportunities for eccentric radial trapping of the Rydberg electron via ponderomotive forces acting on sub-orbital length scales.