Photodissociation spectra of single trapped CaOH+ molecular ions

Abstract

Molecular ions that are generated by chemical reactions with trapped atomic ions can serve as an accessible testbed for developing molecular quantum technologies. On the other hand, they are also a hindrance to scaling up quantum computers based on atomic ions as unavoidable reactions with background gas destroy the information carriers. Here, we investigate the single- and two-photon dissociation processes of single ${\text{CaOH}}^{+}$ molecular ions co-trapped in ${\text{Ca}}^{+}$ ion crystals using a femtosecond laser system. We report the photodissociation cross section spectra of ${\text{CaOH}}^{+}$ for single-photon processes at $\lambda =$245 - 275nm and for two-photon processes at $\lambda =$500 - 540nm. Measurements are interpreted with quantum-chemical calculations, which predict the photodissociation threshold for ${\text{CaOH}}^{+}\to {\text{Ca}}^{+}+\text{OH}$ at 265nm. This result can serve as a basis for dissociation-based spectroscopy for studying the internal structure of ${\text{CaOH}}^{+}$. The result also gives a prescription for recycling ${\text{Ca}}^{+}$ ions in large-scale trapped ${\text{Ca}}^{+}$ quantum experiments from undesired ${\text{CaOH}}^{+}$ ions formed in the presence of background water vapor.

arXiv comment13 pages, 18 figures

References in corpus (22)

• Quantum computation with trapped polar molecules
• Quantum dynamics of cold trapped ions, with application to quantum computation
• A compact ion-trap quantum computing demonstrator
• A quantum information processor with trapped ions
• A new bound on the electron's electric dipole moment
• Preparation and coherent manipulation of pure quantum states of a single molecular ion
• Non-destructive state detection for quantum logic spectroscopy of molecular ions
• Non-Destructive Identification of Cold and Extremely Localized Single Molecular Ions
• Quantum entanglement between an atom and a molecule
• Challenges of laser-cooling molecular ions
• Quantum non-demolition state detection and spectroscopy of single trapped molecules
• Precision frequency-comb terahertz spectroscopy on pure quantum states of a single molecular ion
• Efficient sympathetic motional ground-state cooling of a molecular ion
• The rotational temperature of polar molecular ions in Coulomb crystals
• Sympathetic cooling of molecular ion motion to the ground state
• Observation of vibrational overtones by single molecule resonant photodissociation
• Ab initio properties of the NaLi molecule in the $a^3{\Sigma }^{+}$ electronic state
• State-specific detection of trapped HfF${}^{+}$ by photodissociation
• Rotational State Analysis of AlH+ by Two-Photon Dissociation
• Vibronic spectroscopy of sympathetically cooled CaH${}^{+}$
• Ultrafast infrared spectroscopy with single molecular ions
• Adiabatically controlled motional states of a ground-state cooled CaO${}^{+}$ and Ca${}^{+}$ trapped ion chain

Cited by in corpus (1)

• Precise Determination of Excited State Rotational Constants and Black-Body Thermometry in Coulomb Crystals of Ca${}^{+}$ and CaH${}^{+}$