Quantitative Study of Enantiomer-Specific State Transfer

We here report on a quantitative study of enantiomer-specific state transfer, performed in a pulsed, supersonic molecular beam. The chiral molecule 1-indanol is cooled to low rotational temperatures (1???2 K) and a selected rotational level in the electronic and vibrational ground state of the most abundant conformer is depleted via optical pumping on the S1 ??? S0 transition. Further downstream, three consecutive microwave pulses with mutually perpendicular polarizations and with a well-defined duration and phase are applied. The population in the originally depleted rotational level is subsequently monitored via laserinduced fluorescence detection. This scheme enables a quantitative comparison of experiment and theory for the transfer efficiency in what is the simplest enantiomer-specific state transfer triangle for any chiral molecule, that is, the one involving the absolute ground state level, IJKaKci = I000i. Moreover, this scheme improves the enantiomer enrichment by over an order of magnitude compared to previous works. Starting with a racemic mixture, a straightforward extension of this scheme allows one to create a molecular beam with an enantiomer-pure rotational level, holding great prospects for future spectroscopic and scattering studies.

Automated summary

In this study, we quantitatively investigated enantiomer-specific state transfer using a pulsed supersonic molecular beam. By using optical pumping and microwave pulses, we were able to improve enantiomer enrichment and create a molecular beam with an enantiomer-pure rotational level, which holds great potential for future spectroscopic and scattering studies.