Advances in molecule production and detection techniques for laser cooling experiments

Molecular laser cooling and trapping has the potential to bring a variety of diatomic and polyatomic species into the ultracold regime for applications in quantum science and ultracold chemistry. Many of these applications demand molecule-molecule interactions, and trapped samples at higher density, alongside the introduction of surfaces, such as superconducting circuits or microtrap arrays, near the molecules that will scatter laser light and make standard fluorescence imaging challenging. Here we will present several advances to tackle these challenges including a new cryogenic source design capable of making bright continuous beams of free radicals as the first step towards longer magneto-optical trap loading times [1]. We will also present a novel and sensitive fluorescence imaging technique that is immune to scattered laser light and combines optical cycling with Raman scattering. These general advances are applicable to a wide variety of molecules amenable to laser cooling.