A bright, cold and slow beam of CH radicals for laser cooling and trapping experiments

Techniques to directly laser cool and trap molecules at ultracold temperatures have revealed a new path towards the full quantum control of a diverse range of species with a variety of internal structures. Our experiment will capitalize on this generality by directly laser cooling and trapping CH radicals for tests of ultracold organic chemistry. The low mass and blue optical transitions in this species lead to high recoil velocities which can significantly reduce the required photon budget and rovibrational closure to slow, cool and trap a molecular beam from our cryogenic source. Here we will present our latest results probing in-cell CH interactions, characterizing our slow molecular beam and testing optical cycling protocols.