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Ultracold molecules find the sweet spot for collisions

Engineering the energies of ultracold molecules when they collide has been shown to enhance the probability that they will form complexes — an exciting prospect for precisely controlled chemistry.
  1. Sebastian Will

    1. Sebastian Will is in the Department of Physics, Columbia University, New York, New York 10027, USA.

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  2. Tanya Zelevinsky

    1. Tanya Zelevinsky is in the Department of Physics, Columbia University, New York, New York 10027, USA.

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When atoms are cooled to ultralow temperatures, roughly one microkelvin above absolute zero, they can be assembled into molecules. If the relative energies of these molecules hit a sweet spot known as a resonance, the probability that they briefly bind into a complex on collision can be enhanced. This boost offers the potential for precise control of chemical reactions, for example, or the creation of new quantum phases, but it has remained unclear whether such collisional resonances actually exist. Now, in a paper in Nature, Park et al. report1 that they do — observing strongly enhanced reactions of ultracold sodium–lithium (NaLi) molecules by applying a constant magnetic field. And Chen et al. show2 that this enhancement can be controlled by using oscillating microwave radiation to engineer resonances in systems of sodium–potassium (NaK) molecules.

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Nature 614, 35-36 (2023)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-00242-7

References

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Competing Interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

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