Mitigation of loss within a molecular Stark decelerator

• Published in: The European physical journal. D, Atomic, molecular, and optical physics Vol. 48; no. 2; pp. 197 - 209
• Main Authors: Sawyer, B. C., Stuhl, B. K., Lev, B. L., Ye, J., Hudson, E. R.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Les Ulis EDP Sciences 01.07.2008; Springer; Società italiana di fisica; EDP sciences
• Subjects: Applications of Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos Theory; Atom, molecule and ion trapping and colling methods; Atomic; Atomic and molecular beam sources and techniques; Atomic and molecular physics; Exact sciences and technology; Mechanical control of atoms, molecules and ions; Molecular; Molecular Physics and Chemical Physics; Optical and Plasma Physics; Physical Chemistry; Physics; Physics and Astronomy; Quantum Information Technology; Quantum Physics; Spectroscopy/Spectrometry; Spintronics; 37.20.+j Atomic and molecular beam sources and techniques; 37.10.Mn Slowing and cooling of molecules; 37.90.+j Other topics in mechanical control of atoms, molecules, and ions; Monte Carlo methods; Deceleration; Digital simulation; Theoretical study; Stark effect; Cold molecules; Polar molecule
• ISSN: 1434-6060; 1434-6079
• DOI: 10.1140/epjd/e2008-00097-y

. The transverse motion inside a Stark decelerator plays a large role in the total efficiency of deceleration. We differentiate between two separate regimes of molecule loss during the slowing process. The first mechanism involves distributed loss due to coupling of transverse and longitudinal motion, while the second is a result of the rapid decrease of the molecular velocity within the final few stages. In this work, we describe these effects and present means for overcoming them. Solutions based on modified switching time sequences with the existing decelerator geometry lead to a large gain of stable molecules in the intermediate velocity regime, but fail to address the loss at very low final velocities. We propose a new decelerator design, the quadrupole-guiding decelerator, which eliminates distributed loss due to transverse/longitudinal couplings throughout the slowing process and also exhibits gain over normal deceleration to the lowest velocities.