Progress towards a magneto-optical trapping of MgF molecules for quantum simulation

Recent progress has seen the emergence of dipolar quantum simulators using magnetic atoms and polar molecules. Here we introduce a quantum simulation platform that employs a two-dimensional optical lattice of directly laser-cooled magnesium monofluoride (MgF) molecules. We report our progress towards magneto-optical trapping (MOT) for both bosonic ²⁴MgF and fermionic ²⁵MgF isotopologues. We present the current performance of our ²⁴MgF molecular source. We perform hyperfine spectroscopy of ²⁵MgF necessary for laser cooling and trapping. We also perform simulations of the MOT capture for both ²⁴MgF and ²⁵MgF and discuss the feasibility of making a MOT of fermionic molecules with the knowledge of its complex hyperfine structure (I = 5/2). We discuss our planned design of a high resolution quantum gas microscope that leverages the UV transition wavelength and light mass of MgF to enable the realization of exotic forms of quantum magnetism.