Innovating Works

LIRICO

Financiado
LIght for controlling Reactive Interactions in COld molecules
Ultracold molecules are the next frontier of quantum technologies: their rich internal structure and tunable long-range interactions enable the exploration of new regimes, unattainable with atomic platforms. Achieving this control... Ultracold molecules are the next frontier of quantum technologies: their rich internal structure and tunable long-range interactions enable the exploration of new regimes, unattainable with atomic platforms. Achieving this control requires cooling to ultracold temperatures. However, ultracold molecular interactions are dominated by lossy chemical reactions. Chemical reactions hamper the quantum applications of molecular gases and our strategies to reach the ultracold temperature limit, including the realization of the holy grail of ultracold molecular physics: a Bose-Einstein Condensate of polar molecules. Recently, I successfully developed several shielding mechanisms to protect polar molecules from chemical reactions and exploited them to realize the first quantum degenerate Fermi gas of molecules by direct evaporation. In LIRICO, I will leverage on these previous results to control the chemical reactions of ultracold molecules and thus unlock the full potential of molecular quantum gases. A high-finesse optical cavity will be the fulcrum of LIRICO to tame chemical reactions. Strong light-molecule coupling will create new hybrid light-molecule states, so called molecular polaritons, that will display the ability to turn on-and-off a chemical reaction by simply controlling the molecule-cavity resonance. The addition of final-state sensitive detection methods, such as an ion-mass spectrometer, will allow to fully resolve the microscopic mechanisms that underpin ultracold reactions. I will steer the reaction dynamics at will and control the reaction product distribution with the cavity vacuum, thus realizing a paradigm-changing, fully quantum-mechanical catalysis method for controlling the transformation of molecular materials. Cavity-control of ultracold chemical reactions will open new avenues in the dissipation engineering of inelastic and out-of-equilibrium processes, which is crucial for the development of molecular quantum technologies. ver más
31/12/2028
MPG
1M€
Duración del proyecto: 63 meses Fecha Inicio: 2023-09-12
Fecha Fin: 2028-12-31

Línea de financiación: concedida

El organismo HORIZON EUROPE notifico la concesión del proyecto el día 2023-09-12
Línea de financiación objetivo El proyecto se financió a través de la siguiente ayuda:
ERC-2023-STG: ERC STARTING GRANTS
Cerrada hace 2 años
Presupuesto El presupuesto total del proyecto asciende a 1M€
Líder del proyecto
MAXPLANCKGESELLSCHAFT ZUR FORDERUNG DER WISSE... No se ha especificado una descripción o un objeto social para esta compañía.
Perfil tecnológico TRL 4-5