Foundations for Trapped Molecular Ion Parity-Violation Studies

该项目开发了能够测量镜像对称破坏的技术，使用长时间保持的分子离子，几乎处于静止状态，并在线性射频陷阱中与环境隔离良好。 要克服的主要挑战是发展控制和非破坏性读出单个捕获分子离子的旋转量子态的能力。虽然与原子相比，分子在控制和读出方面需要格外小心，但其主要优点是相反宇称旋转能级在能量上本质上是附近的，因此比典型原子的电子能级更容易被弱力混合。 核自旋相关的宇称破缺对于理解标准模型中的纯强子弱相互作用是非常重要的，它们为寻找TeV能量尺度下的新物理提供了一种特殊的低能途径。 这项工作的动机是核自旋相关的宇称违反调查，但其他重要的应用，提高精度的分子光谱学包括测量的时间变化的电子-质子质量比，研究宇称违反手性分子的结构，并发现一个电子电偶极矩。 此外，这里开发的单分子离子光谱、内部和外部量子态控制和状态读出的成分可能是分子离子量子信息处理应用和低温化学反应研究的基本要素。本提案中正在开发的光谱技术有可能影响其他科学领域，如大气和天体物理光谱学-在这些领域，人们对在电磁光谱的所谓分子“指纹”区域开发分子旋转和振动光谱学的改进方法和工具有很大兴趣。 一个强大的本科生和研究生教育和培训计划是由研究维护。 目前实验室的学生群体是多样化的，包括代表性不足的少数民族。

This project develops techniques which enable measurement of mirror-symmetry violation, using molecular ions held for long periods of time, nearly at rest, and well isolated from their environment in linear radiofrequency traps. The major challenges to be overcome are development of capabilities to control and non-destructively read out the rotational quantum state of a single trapped molecular ion. Although molecules require extra care in control and readout as compared with atoms, the principle advantage is that opposite-parity rotational levels are intrinsically nearby in energy and thereby more substantially mixed by the weak force than are electronic levels of typical atoms. Nuclear spin-dependent parity violation is important for understanding purely hadronic weak interactions of the Standard Model, and they provide a special low-energy approach for searching for new physics at TeV energy scales. This work is motivated by nuclear spin-dependent parity-violation investigations, but other important applications of improved precision molecular spectroscopy include measurements of time-variation of the electron-proton mass ratio, study of parity violation in the structure of chiral molecules, and discovery of an electron electric dipole moment. Furthermore, the ingredients for single molecular ion spectroscopy, internal and external quantum state control and state readout developed here, could be essential elements for molecular-ion quantum information processing applications and for studies of low-temperature chemical reactions. The spectroscopic techniques being developed in this proposal have potential to impact other areas of science as diverse as atmospheric and astrophysical spectroscopy -- where there is great interest in developing improved methods and tools for molecular rotational and vibrational spectroscopy in the so-called molecular "fingerprint" region of the electromagnetic spectrum. A strong program of undergraduate and graduate education and training is maintained by the research. The current group of students in the lab is diverse and includes underrepresented minorities.