The RbSr 2Σ+ ground state investigated via spectroscopy of hot and ultracold molecules.

We report on spectroscopic studies of hot and ultracold RbSr molecules, and combine the results in an analysis that allows us to fit a potential energy curve (PEC) for the X(1)2Σ+ ground state bridging the short-to-long-range domains. The ultracold RbSr molecules are created in a µK sample of Rb and Sr atoms and probed by two-colour photoassociation spectroscopy. The data yield the long-range dispersion coefficients C6 and C8, along with the total number of supported bound levels. The hot RbSr molecules are created in a 1000 K gas mixture of Rb and Sr in a heat-pipe oven and probed by thermoluminescence and laser-induced fluorescence spectroscopy. We compare the hot molecule data with spectra we simulated using previously published PECs determined by three different ab initio theoretical methods. We identify several band heads corresponding to radiative decay from the B(2)2Σ+ state to the deepest bound levels of X(1)2Σ+. We determine a mass-scaled high-precision model for X(1)2Σ+ by fitting all data using a single fit procedure. The corresponding PEC is consistent with all data, thus spanning short-to-long internuclear distances and bridging an energy gap of about 75% of the potential well depth, still uncharted by any experiment. We benchmark previous ab initio PECs against our results, and give the PEC fit parameters for both X(1)2Σ+ and B(2)2Σ+ states. As first outcomes of our analysis, we calculate the s-wave scattering properties for all stable isotopic combinations and corroborate the locations of Fano-Feshbach resonances between alkali Rb and closed-shell Sr atoms recently observed [V. Barbéet al., Nat. Phys., 2018, 14, 881]. These results and more generally our strategy should greatly contribute to the generation of ultracold alkali-alkaline-earth dimers, whose applications range from quantum simulation to state-controlled quantum chemistry.

Quantum Engineering of a Low-Entropy Gas of Heteronuclear Bosonic Molecules in an Optical Lattice.

We demonstrate a generally applicable technique for mixing two-species quantum degenerate bosonic samples in the presence of an optical lattice, and we employ it to produce low-entropy samples of ultracold ^{87}Rb^{133}Cs Feshbach molecules with a lattice filling fraction exceeding 30%. Starting from two spatially separated Bose-Einstein condensates of Rb and Cs atoms, Rb-Cs atom pairs are efficiently produced by using the superfluid-to-Mott insulator quantum phase transition twice, first for the Cs sample, then for the Rb sample, after nulling the Rb-Cs interaction at a Feshbach resonance's zero crossing. We form molecules out of atom pairs and characterize the mixing process in terms of sample overlap and mixing speed. The dense and ultracold sample of more than 5000 RbCs molecules is an ideal starting point for experiments in the context of quantum many-body physics with long-range dipolar interactions.

Pinning quantum phase transition for a Luttinger liquid of strongly interacting bosons.

Quantum many-body systems can have phase transitions even at zero temperature; fluctuations arising from Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, as opposed to thermal effects, drive the system from one phase to another. Typically, during the transition the relative strength of two competing terms in the system's Hamiltonian changes across a finite critical value. A well-known example is the Mott-Hubbard quantum phase transition from a superfluid to an insulating phase, which has been observed for weakly interacting bosonic atomic gases. However, for strongly interacting quantum systems confined to lower-dimensional geometry, a novel type of quantum phase transition may be induced and driven by an arbitrarily weak perturbation to the Hamiltonian. Here we observe such an effect--the sine-Gordon quantum phase transition from a superfluid Luttinger liquid to a Mott insulator--in a one-dimensional quantum gas of bosonic caesium atoms with tunable interactions. For sufficiently strong interactions, the transition is induced by adding an arbitrarily weak optical lattice commensurate with the atomic granularity, which leads to immediate pinning of the atoms. We map out the phase diagram and find that our measurements in the strongly interacting regime agree well with a quantum field description based on the exactly solvable sine-Gordon model. We trace the phase boundary all the way to the weakly interacting regime, where we find good agreement with the predictions of the one-dimensional Bose-Hubbard model. Our results open up the experimental study of quantum phase transitions, criticality and transport phenomena beyond Hubbard-type models in the context of ultracold gases.

Ultracold dense samples of dipolar RbCs molecules in the rovibrational and hyperfine ground state.

We produce ultracold dense trapped samples of ^{87}Rb^{133}Cs molecules in their rovibrational ground state, with full nuclear hyperfine state control, by stimulated Raman adiabatic passage (STIRAP) with efficiencies of 90%. We observe the onset of hyperfine-changing collisions when the magnetic field is ramped so that the molecules are no longer in the hyperfine ground state. A strong quadratic shift of the transition frequencies as a function of applied electric field shows the strongly dipolar character of the RbCs ground-state molecule. Our results open up the prospect of realizing stable bosonic dipolar quantum gases with ultracold molecules.

Active stabilization of kilogauss magnetic fields to the ppm level for magnetoassociation on ultranarrow Feshbach resonances.

Feshbach association of ultracold molecules using narrow resonances requires exquisite control of the applied magnetic field. Here, we present a magnetic field control system to deliver magnetic fields of over 1000 G with ppm-level precision integrated into an ultracold-atom experimental setup. We combine a battery-powered, current-stabilized power supply with active feedback stabilization of the magnetic field using fluxgate magnetic field sensors. As a real-world test, we perform microwave spectroscopy of ultracold Rb atoms and demonstrate an upper limit on our magnetic field stability of 2.4(3) mG at 1050 G [2.3(3) ppm relative] as determined from the spectral feature.

Molecular spectroscopy for ground-state transfer of ultracold RbCs molecules.

We perform one- and two-photon high resolution spectroscopy on ultracold samples of RbCs Feshbach molecules with the aim to identify a suitable route for efficient ground-state transfer in the quantum-gas regime to produce quantum gases of dipolar RbCs ground-state molecules. One-photon loss spectroscopy allows us to probe deeply bound rovibrational levels of the mixed excited (A(1)Σ(+)-b(3)Π)0(+) molecular states. Two-photon dark state spectroscopy connects the initial Feshbach state to the rovibronic ground state. We determine the binding energy of the lowest rovibrational level |v'' = 0, J'' = 0> of the X(1)Σ(+) ground state to be D = 3811.5755(16) cm(-1), a 300-fold improvement in accuracy with respect to previous data. We are now in the position to perform stimulated two-photon Raman transfer to the rovibronic ground state.

Confinement-induced resonances in low-dimensional quantum systems.

We report on the observation of confinement-induced resonances in strongly interacting quantum-gas systems with tunable interactions for one- and two-dimensional geometry. Atom-atom scattering is substantially modified when the s-wave scattering length approaches the length scale associated with the tight transversal confinement, leading to characteristic loss and heating signatures. Upon introducing an anisotropy for the transversal confinement we observe a splitting of the confinement-induced resonance. With increasing anisotropy additional resonances appear. In the limit of a two-dimensional system we find that one resonance persists.

Inducing transport in a dissipation-free lattice with super Bloch oscillations.

Particles in a perfect lattice potential perform Bloch oscillations when subject to a constant force, leading to localization and preventing conductivity. For a weakly interacting Bose-Einstein condensate of Cs atoms, we observe giant center-of-mass oscillations in position space with a displacement across hundreds of lattice sites when we add a periodic modulation to the force near the Bloch frequency. We study the dependence of these "super" Bloch oscillations on lattice depth, modulation amplitude, and modulation frequency and show that they provide a means to induce linear transport in a dissipation-free lattice.