0000000000242576
AUTHOR
Micah P. Ledbetter
Production and detection of atomic hexadecapole at Earth's magnetic field
Anisotropy of atomic states is characterized by population differences and coherences between Zeeman sublevels. It can be efficiently created and probed via resonant interactions with light, the technique which is at the heart of modern atomic clocks and magnetometers. Recently, nonlinear magneto-optical techniques have been developed for selective production and detection of higher polarization moments, hexadecapole and hexacontatetrapole, in the ground states of the alkali atoms. Extension of these techniques into the range of geomagnetic fields is important for practical applications. This is because hexadecapole polarization corresponding to the $\Delta M=4$ Zeeman coherence, with maxim…
Production and detection of atomic hexadecapole at Earth’s magnetic field
We report a novel method that allows selective creation and detection of a macroscopic long lived hexadecapole polarization in the F = 2 ground state of 87Rb atoms at Earth's magnetic field (510 mG).
Proposal for a Cosmic Axion Spin Precession Experiment (CASPEr)
We propose an experiment to search for QCD axion and axionlike-particle dark matter. Nuclei that are interacting with the background axion dark matter acquire time-varying CP-odd nuclear moments such as an electric dipole moment. In analogy with nuclear magnetic resonance, these moments cause precession of nuclear spins in a material sample in the presence of an electric field. Precision magnetometry can be used to search for such precession. An initial phase of this experiment could cover many orders of magnitude in axionlike-particle parameter space beyond the current astrophysical and laboratory limits. And with established techniques, the proposed experimental scheme has sensitivity to …
Rubidium dimers in paraffin-coated cells
Measurements were made to determine the density of rubidium dimer vapor in paraffin-coated cells. The number density of dimers and atoms in similar paraffin-coated and uncoated cells was measured by optical spectroscopy. Due to the relatively low melting point of paraffin, a limited temperature range of 43-80 deg C was explored, with the lower end corresponding to a dimer density of less than 10^7 cm^(-3). With one-minute integration time, a sensitivity to dimer number density of better than 10^6 cm^(-3) was achieved. No significant difference in dimer density was observed between the cells.
Measurement of untruncated nuclear spin interactions via zero- to ultralow-field nuclear magnetic resonance
Zero- to ultra-low-field nuclear magnetic resonance (ZULF NMR) provides a new regime for the measurement of nuclear spin-spin interactions free from effects of large magnetic fields, such as truncation of terms that do not commute with the Zeeman Hamiltonian. One such interaction, the magnetic dipole-dipole coupling, is a valuable source of spatial information in NMR, though many terms are unobservable in high-field NMR, and the coupling averages to zero under isotropic molecular tumbling. Under partial alignment, this information is retained in the form of so-called residual dipolar couplings. We report zero- to ultra-low-field NMR measurements of residual dipolar couplings in acetonitrile…
Zero-field nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy of viscous liquids
Abstract We report zero-field NMR measurements of a viscous organic liquid, ethylene glycol. Zero-field spectra were taken showing resolved scalar spin–spin coupling (J-coupling) for ethylene glycol at different temperatures and water contents. Molecular dynamics strongly affects the resonance linewidth, which closely follows viscosity. Quantum chemical calculations have been used to obtain the relative stability and coupling constants of all ethylene glycol conformers. The results show the potential of zero-field NMR as a probe of molecular structure and dynamics in a wide range of environments, including viscous fluids.