Quantum scattering of icosahedron fullerene C with noble-gas atoms.

There exist multiple ways to cool neutral molecules. A front runner is the technique of buffer gas cooling, where momentum-changing collisions with abundant cold noble-gas atoms cool the molecules. This approach can, in principle, produce the most diverse samples of cold molecules.

Quantum Control of Atom-Ion Charge Exchange via Light-Induced Conical Intersections.

Conical intersections are crossing points or lines between two or more adiabatic electronic potential energy surfaces in the multidimensional coordinate space of colliding atoms and molecules. Conical intersections and corresponding nonadiabatic coupling can greatly affect molecular dynamics and chemical properties. In this paper, we predict significant or measurable nonadiabatic effects in an ultracold atom-ion charge-exchange reaction in the presence of laser-induced conical intersections (LICIs).

Elastic and glancing-angle rate coefficients for heating of ultracold Li and Rb atoms by collisions with room-temperature noble gases, H, and N.

Trapped ultracold alkali-metal atoms can be used to measure pressure in the ultra-high-vacuum and XHV pressure regimes, those with p < 10 Pa. This application for ultracold atoms relies on precise knowledge of collision rate coefficients of alkali-metal atoms with residual room-temperature atoms and molecules in the ambient vacuum or with deliberately introduced gasses. Here, we determine combined elastic and inelastic rate coefficients as well as glancing-angle rate coefficients for ultracold Li and Rb with room-temperature noble gas atoms as well as H and N molecules.

Precise quantum measurement of vacuum with cold atoms.

We describe the cold-atom vacuum standards (CAVS) under development at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The CAVS measures pressure in the ultra-high and extreme-high vacuum regimes by measuring the loss rate of sub-millikelvin sensor atoms from a magnetic trap. Ab initio quantum scattering calculations of cross sections and rate coefficients relate the density of background gas molecules or atoms to the loss rate of ultra-cold sensor atoms.

Simplify your life.

Within the Hartree atomic unit systems, the Schrödinger equation becomes parameter free. But there's more to it than making a student's life easier, as Gordon Drake and Eite Tiesinga recount.