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arXiv:2208.06380

Quantum metrology with ultracold chemical reactions

Seong-Ho Shinn, Uwe R. Fischer, Daniel Braun

Published Aug 12, 2022• 0 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Chemical chain reactions are known to enable extremely sensitive detection schemes in chemical, biological, and medical analysis, and have even been used in the search for dark matter. Here we show that coherent, ultracold chemical reactions harbor great potential for quantum metrology: In an atom-molecule Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), a weak external perturbation can modify the reaction dynamics and lead to the coherent creation of molecules in an atom-dominant regime which can be selectively detected with modern spectroscopic techniques. This promises to substantially improve the viability of previously proposed BEC-based sensors for acceleration, gravitational waves, and other physical quantities, including the detection of dark matter, that so far relied on the detection of the tiny density modulations caused by the creation of single phonons.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.2208.06380

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Chemical chain reactions are known to enable extremely sensitive detection schemes in chemical, biological, and medical analysis, and have even been used in the search for dark matter. Here we show that coherent, ultracold chemical reactions harbor great potential for quantum metrology: In an atom-molecule Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), a weak external perturbation can modify the reaction dynamics and lead to the coherent creation of molecules in an atom-dominant regime which can be selectively detected with modern spectroscopic techniques. This promises to substantially improve the viability of previously proposed BEC-based sensors for acceleration, gravitational waves, and other physical quantities, including the detection of dark matter, that so far relied on the detection of the tiny density modulations caused by the creation of single phonons.
Abstract Chemical chain reactions are known to enable extremely sensitive detection schemes in chemical, biological, and medical analysis, and have even been used in the search for dark matter. Here we show that coherent, ultracold chemical reactions harbor great potential for quantum metrology: In an atom-molecule Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), a weak external perturbation can modify the reaction dynamics and lead to the coherent creation of molecules in an atom-dominant regime which can be selectively detected with modern spectroscopic techniques. This promises to substantially improve the viability of previously proposed BEC-based sensors for acceleration, gravitational waves, and other physical quantities, including the detection of dark matter, that so far relied on the detection of the tiny density modulations caused by the creation of single phonons.
With the creation of ultracold atoms and molecules, a new type of chemistry---``resonance'' chemistry---emerges: chemical reactions can occur when the energy of colliding atoms and molecules matches a bound state of the combined molecule (Feshbach resonance). This chemistry is rather similar to reactions that take place in nuclei at low energies. In this paper we suggest some problems for future experimental and theoretical work related to the resonance chemistry of ultracold molecules. Molecular Bose-Einstein condensates are particularly interesting because in this system collisions and chemical reactions are extremely sensitive to weak fields; also, a preferred reaction channel may be enhanced due to a finite number of final states. The sensitivity to weak fields arises due to the high density of narrow compound resonances and the macroscopic number of molecules with kinetic energy E=0E=0E=0 (in the ground state of a mean-field potential). The high sensitivity to the magnetic field may be used to measure the distribution of energy intervals, widths, and magnetic moments of compound resonances and study the onset of quantum chaos. A difference in the production rate of right-handed and left-handed chiral molecules may be produced by external electric E\mathbf{E}E and magnetic B\mathbf{B}B fields and the finite width $\ensuremath{\Gamma}$ of the resonance (correlation $\ensuremath{\Gamma}\mathbf{E}∙\mathbf{B}$). The same effect may be produced by the parity-violating energy difference in chiral molecules.
Advances in atomic, molecular, and optical physics techniques allowed the cooling of simple molecules down to the ultracold regime ([Formula: see text]1 mK) and opened opportunities to study chemical reactions with unprecedented levels of control. This review covers recent developments in studying bimolecular chemistry at ultralow temperatures. We begin with a brief overview of methods for producing, manipulating, and detecting ultracold molecules. We then survey experimental works that exploit the controllability of ultracold molecules to probe and modify their long-range interactions. Further combining the use of physical chemistry techniques such as mass spectrometry and ion imaging significantly improved the detection of ultracold reactions and enabled explorations of their dynamics in the short range. We discuss a series of studies on the reaction KRb + KRb → K 2 + Rb 2 initiated below 1 μK, including the direct observation of a long-lived complex, the demonstration of product rotational state control via conserved nuclear spins, and a test of the statistical model using the complete quantum state distribution of the products.
This article reviews the current state of the art in the field of cold and ultracold molecules and demonstrates that chemical reactions, inelastic collisions and dissociation of molecules at subkelvin temperatures can be manipulated with external electric or magnetic fields. The creation of ultracold molecules may allow for spectroscopy measurements with extremely high precision and tests of fundamental symmetries of nature, quantum computation with molecules as qubits, and controlled chemistry. The probability of chemical reactions and collisional energy transfer can be very large at temperatures near zero kelvin. The collision energy of ultracold atoms and molecules is much smaller than perturbations due to interactions with external electric or magnetic fields available in the laboratory. External fields may therefore be used to induce dissociation of weakly bound molecules, stimulate forbidden electronic transitions, suppress the effect of centrifugal barriers in outgoing reaction channels or tune Feshbach resonances that enhance chemical reactivity.
The experimental realization of atomic Bose-Einstein condensation at ultracold temperature has led to rapid advances in creating and manipulating cold molecules, and which has given birth to a new research field of quantum matter-wave superchemistry. Contrary to the classical Arrhenius law, the tunneling-dominated ultracold reactions can be realized through the highly-controlled magneto-optical technique. Novel quantum effects have been identified in these cold reactions, such as the super-selectivity rule in dissociating triatomic molecules, and the quantum size (vessel-shape) effect. In this review, we focus on a variety of new achievements in this fascinating matter-wave wonderland, including the quantum finite-number effect and double-slit interference in assembling cold molecules, the quantum noise in triggering collective abstraction reaction, and the magnetic phase transition in a laser-catalyzed quantum spin-mixing gas. The practical applications of matter-wave superchemistry are also introduced, such as the optical information storage via quantum photo-association, and the laser-enhanced creation of spinor or even chiral molecules.