Observation of molecules produced from a Bose-Einstein condensate

Max-Planck Institut fur Quantenoptik, Garching, Germany

3.30pm, Thursday 18 December 2003, AR103 Seminar Room, Graduate Research Centre

Starting with a condensate of ⁸⁷Rb atoms, molecules are created by adiabatically sweeping the magnetic field across a Feshbach resonance located at 1007.4 G. In a Stern-Gerlach experiment the molecules are separated from the atoms by applying a magnetic-field gradient. From the measured position of the molecules their magnetic moment is extracted. It turns out that this quantity strongly depends on the magnetic field, thus revealing an avoided crossing of two bound states at 1001.7 G. It is experimentally demonstrated that this avoided crossing can be exploited to trap the molecules in one dimension. Moreover, heating and loss processes accompanying the production of the molecules seem to be a severe obstacle when trying to produce a molecular BEC.

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