Observation and laser spectroscopy of ytterbium monomethoxide, YbOCH${}_3$

Abstract

We describe a laser spectroscopic study of ytterbium monomethoxide, YbOCH${}_3$, a species of interest to searches for time-reversal symmetry violation using laser-cooled molecules. We report measurements of vibrational structure in the $\tilde{X}$ and $\tilde{A}$ states, vibrational branching ratios for several components of the $\tilde{A}$ state, and radiative lifetimes of low-lying electronic states. $\text{Ab initio}$ calculations are used to aid the assignment of vibronic emission bands and provide insight into the electronic and vibrational structure. Our results demonstrate that rapid optical cycling is feasible for YbOCH${}_3$, opening a path to orders-of-magnitude increased sensitivity in future measurements of P- and/or T-violating physics.

14 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (9)

• Magneto-optical trapping of a diatomic molecule
• Precision Measurement of Time-Reversal Symmetry Violation with Laser-Cooled Polyatomic Molecules
• Candidate molecular ions for an electron electric dipole moment experiment
• Prospects for an electron electric dipole moment search in metastable ThO and ThF${}^{+}$
• Enhancement factor for the electric dipole moment of the electron in the BaOH and YbOH molecules
• Determination of CaOH and CaOCH${}_3$ vibrational branching ratios for direct laser cooling and trapping
• Enhanced sensitivity of the electron electric dipole moment from YbOH: The role of theory
• Chiral molecules as sensitive probes for direct detection of $\mathcal{P}$-odd cosmic fields
• Parity nonconserving interactions of electrons in chiral molecules with cosmic fields

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Accurate prediction and measurement of vibronic branching ratios for laser cooling linear polyatomic molecules
• Laser-coolable AcOH${}^{+}$ ion for $\mathcal{C}\mathcal{P}$-violation searches
• Static electric dipole moment of the francium atom induced by axionlike particle exchange