Towards an optical tweezer array of individually trapped RbCs molecules

The rich internal structure and intrinsic dipolar interactions possessed by polar molecules makes them a promising system for exploring quantum chemistry, quantum computation and quantum simulation. However, to fully realise their potential in these areas, single-site control and detection of molecules is desirable. Such control is natively realised using optical tweezer arrays to confine the molecules, which enables trapping and rearrangement of the particles to create arrays in flexible geometries.

 

In this talk, I will describe our progress towards our goal of producing single RbCs molecules in optical tweezers. I will summarise our experimental setup for trapping and manipulation of single Rb and Cs atoms using species-specific optical tweezers. The number-resolved preparation of atoms in tweezers make them an attractive platform for studying collisions. To demonstrate this I will present experiments where the species-specific tweezers are merged together in order to study collisions between single Rb and Cs atoms in a range of hyperfine states. In addition, I will present our progress towards cooling both Rb and Cs atoms to the 3D motional ground state of the tweezer traps, a critical step before the atoms can be associated into a weakly-bound molecule. As an outlook, I will describe our plans for combining these molecules with Rydberg atoms in a new platform which will enable quantum non-demolition readout of the molecule's quantum state and photoassocaition of giant polyatomic Rydberg molecules.