Magneto-Optical Trapping of CaH: Toward Controlled Ultracold Chemistry

Our recent demonstration of the magneto-optical trapping of calcium monohydride (CaH) molecules opens new prospects for high-precision hydrogen spectroscopy and studies of ultracold chemical reactions. A two-photon stimulated pathway can be implemented to coherently dissociate the trapped CaH molecules, producing an ultracold and trapped sample of hydrogen atoms for high-precision spectroscopy. Furthermore, external magnetic fields could control chemical reactivity by tuning selected hyperfine states. Specifically for the Li + CaH --> LiH + Ca reaction, reactivity can be suppressed via the magnetic decoupling of electronic and nuclear spins. Ultracold CaH is a promising platform for demonstrating this field-induced suppression. In this talk, we discuss hardware upgrades that will enable both explorations, including improvement in phase-space density of CaH, optical dipole trapping and transport, and a science chamber with ion detection and velocity-mapped imaging capabilities.