Ultracold spin-polarized mixtures of 2Sigma molecules with S-state atoms: Collisional stability and implications for sympathetic cooling

Abstract

The prospects of sympathetic cooling of polar molecules with magnetically co-trapped alkali-metal atoms are generally considered poor due to strongly anisotropic atom-molecule interactions leading to large spin relaxation rates. Using rigorous quantum scattering calculations based on ab initio interaction potentials, we show that inelastic spin relaxation in low-temperature collisions of CaH(2Sigma) molecules with Li and Mg atoms occurs at a slow rate despite the strongly anisotropic interactions. This unexpected result, which we rationalize using multichannel quantum defect theory, opens up the possibility of sympathetic cooling of polar 2Sigma molecules with alkali-metal and alkaline-earth atoms in a magnetic trap.

5 pages, 3 figures, 0 tables

References in corpus (10)

• Laser cooling of a diatomic molecule
• Controlling the quantum stereodynamics of ultracold bimolecular reactions
• Magnetic trapping and Zeeman relaxation of imidogen (NH X-triplet-Sigma)
• Ultracold Rb-OH collisions and prospects for sympathetic cooling
• Cold N+NH Collisions in a Magnetic Trap
• Cold and Slow Molecular Beam
• Multichannel Quantum Defect Theory for cold molecular collisions
• Cold collisions of N atoms and NH molecules in magnetic fields
• Sympathetic cooling of polyatomic molecules with S-state atoms in a magnetic trap
• Tunable disorder in a crystal of cold polar molecules

Cited by in corpus (32)

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• Laser slowing of CaF molecules to near the capture velocity of a molecular MOT
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• Collisions Between Ultracold Molecules and Atoms in a Magnetic Trap
• Atom-molecule collisions, spin relaxation, and sympathetic cooling in an ultracold spin-polarized Rb(${}^2\mathrm{S}$)-SrF${(}^2{\Sigma }^{+})$ mixture
• The approach to chaos in ultracold atomic and molecular physics: statistics of near-threshold bound states for Li+CaH and Li+CaF
• Efficient method for quantum calculations of molecule - molecule scattering properties in a magnetic field
• Quantum spin state selectivity and magnetic tuning of ultracold chemical reactions of triplet alkali-metal dimers with alkali-metal atoms
• Universal probability distributions of scattering observables in ultracold molecular collisions
• Molecular Collisions: from Near-cold to Ultra-cold
• Cold collisions of heavy ${}^2\Sigma$ molecules with alkali-metal atoms in a magnetic field: Ab initio analysis and prospects for sympathetic cooling of SrOH${(}^2\Sigma )$ by Li(${}^2$S)
• Ab Initio Study of Chemical Reactions of Cold SrF and CaF Molecules with Alkali-Metal and Alkaline-Earth-Metal Atoms
• Total angular momentum representation for atom-molecule collisions in electric fields
• Adiabatic Channel Capture Theory Applied to Cold Atom-Molecule Reactions: Li + CaH -> LiH + Ca at 1 K
• Magnetic tuning of ultracold barrierless chemical reactions
• Signatures of Non-universal Quantum Dynamics of Ultracold Chemical Reactions of Polar Alkali-dimer Molecules with Alkali-metal Atoms: Li(${}^2$S) +NaLi($a^3{\Sigma }^{+}$) $\to$ Na(${}^2$S) + Li${}_2$($a^3{\Sigma }_u^{+}$)
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• Sympathetic cooling and slowing of molecules with Rydberg atoms
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• Nuclear spin relaxation in cold atom-molecule collisions
• Total angular momentum representation for state-to-state quantum scattering of cold molecules in a magnetic field
• Elastic and inelastic collisions of ${}^2\Sigma$ molecules in a magnetic field
• Ultracold molecular collisions in magnetic fields: Efficient incorporation of hyperfine structure in the total rotational angular momentum representation
• Restricted basis set coupled-channel calculations on atom-molecule collisions in magnetic fields
• The Li + CaF $\to$ Ca + LiF chemical reaction under cold conditions
• Hyperfine and Zeeman interactions in ultracold collisions of molecular hydrogen with atomic lithium
• Rigorous quantum calculations for atom-molecule chemical reactions in electric fields: from single to multiple partial wave regimes
• Simultaneous Zeeman deceleration of polyatomic free radical with lithium atoms