Observation of Rydberg blockade due to the charge-dipole interaction between an atom and a polar molecule

Guttridge, A.; Ruttley, D.K.; Baldock, A.; González-Férez, R.; Sadeghpour, H.R.; Adams, C.S.; Cornish, S.L.

Abstract

We demonstrate Rydberg blockade due to the charge-dipole interaction between a single Rb atom and a single RbCs molecule confined in optical tweezers. The molecule is formed by magnetoassociation of a Rb+Cs atom pair and subsequently transferred to the rovibrational ground state with an efficiency of 91(1)%. Species-specific tweezers are used to control the separation between the atom and molecule. The charge-dipole interaction causes blockade of the transition to the Rb(52s) Rydberg state, when the atom-molecule separation is set to 310(40) nm. The observed excitation dynamics are in good agreement with simulations using calculated interaction potentials. Our results open up the prospect of a hybrid platform where quantum information is transferred between individually trapped molecules using Rydberg atoms.

Citation

Guttridge, A., Ruttley, D., Baldock, A., González-Férez, R., Sadeghpour, H., Adams, C., & Cornish, S. (2023). Observation of Rydberg blockade due to the charge-dipole interaction between an atom and a polar molecule. Physical Review Letters, 131(1), Article 013401. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.013401

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: May 15, 2023
• Online Publication Date: Sep 7, 2023
• Publication Date: Jul 7, 2023
• Deposit Date: Mar 26, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 19, 2023
• Journal: Physical Review Letters
• Print ISSN: 0031-9007
• Electronic ISSN: 1079-7114
• Publisher: American Physical Society
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 131
• Issue: 1
• Article Number: 013401
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.013401
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1178412
• Related Public URLs: https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2303.06126