Control of an Ultracold Photochemical Reaction via Quantum Interference

Ultracold atomic systems are a rich platform for studying numerous quantum phenomena due to their amenability to being precisely controlled and widely tunable. One such phenomenon we would like to study is control over the rate of photoassociation (PA) of two Rb atoms into an Rb2 molecule by carefully preparing the reactants in superposition states. We have studied PA in a Raman-dressed 87Rb Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) and a radio frequency (RF)-dressed BEC. In the Raman-dressed case we have experimentally observed changes in the PA rate consistent with our theory of destructive interference between the two allowed PA pathways for our selected scattering state. In addition, we propose an RF-dressed scheme for full control of the interference between PA pathways by varying the relative phase between the RF couplings. We will also show the experimental progress towards realizing such a scheme.