Seconds-scale coherence on nuclear spin transitions of ultracold polar molecules in 3D optical lattices

Junyu Lin; Junyu He; Mucan Jin; Guanghua Chen; Dajun Wang

doi:10.1103/physrevlett.128.223201

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arXiv · 2111.10013

Seconds-scale coherence on nuclear spin transitions of ultracold polar molecules in 3D optical lattices

Junyu Lin·Junyu He·Mucan Jin·Guanghua Chen·Dajun Wang

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Abstract

Ultracold polar molecules (UPMs) are emerging as a novel and powerful platform for fundamental applications in quantum science. Here, we report characterization of the coherence between nuclear spin levels of ultracold ground-state sodium-rubidium molecules loaded into a 3D optical lattice with a nearly photon scattering limited trapping lifetime of 9(1) seconds. After identifying and compensating the main sources of decoherence, we achieve a maximum nuclear spin coherence time of $T_2^* = 3.3(6)$~s with two-photon Ramsey spectroscopy. Furthermore, based on the understanding of the main factor limiting the coherence of the two-photon Rabi transition, we obtain a Rabi lineshape with linewidth below 0.8 Hz. The simultaneous realization of long lifetime and coherence time, and ultra-high spectroscopic resolution in our system unveils the great potentials of UPMs in quantum simulation, computation, and metrology.

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Junyu Lin, Junyu He, Mucan Jin, Guanghua Chen, Dajun Wang. 2021-11-19. Seconds-scale coherence on nuclear spin transitions of ultracold polar molecules in 3D optical lattices. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.128.223201

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