Enantiomer-specific pumping of chiral molecules in high-J rotational states
Abstract
Enantiomer-specific state transfer (ESST) based on electric-dipole transitions has attracted considerable interest in the studies of manipulating molecules with electromagnetic fields. It also holds promise as a powerful tool for enantiomer detection and separation. To date, experimental demonstrations of ESST have focused mainly on molecules in the lowest rotational angular-momentum states, namely, J=0 and J=1. Realistic molecular samples, however, may contain appreciable populations in higher-J rotational states, making it desirable to develop ESST schemes applicable to such states. Nevertheless, one cannot derive such schemes via a simple and straightforward extension of existing low-J schemes, because higher-J manifolds contain more magnetic sub-levels and involve more complicated networks of electric-dipole transitions. Here, we propose an ESST scheme for chiral molecules involving the J=1 and J=2 rotational states. Specifically, our scheme is based on enantiomer-specific pumping driven by three linearly polarized microwave fields and one laser beam. Under this scheme, one enantiomer is pumped into an enantiomer-specific dark state within a sub manifold with J=1,2, whereas the other enantiomer is dissipatively pumped out of this manifold. Our strategy can be extended to systems involving rotational states with even higher angular momenta.
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BibTeX
@misc{zou2026enantiomerspecific,
title = {{Enantiomer-specific pumping of chiral molecules in high-$J$ rotational states}},
author = {Fen Zou and Yan Gao and Peng Zhang},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.35008},
eprint = {2609.35008},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.35008},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Enantiomer-specific pumping of chiral molecules in high-J rotational states
AU - Fen Zou
AU - Yan Gao
AU - Peng Zhang
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/28
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.35008
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.35008
AB - Enantiomer-specific state transfer (ESST) based on electric-dipole transitions has attracted considerable interest in the studies of manipulating molecules with electromagnetic fields. It also holds promise as a powerful tool for enantiomer detection and separation. To date, experimental demonstrations of ESST have focused mainly on molecules in the lowest rotational angular-momentum states, namely, J=0 and J=1. Realistic molecular samples, however, may contain appreciable populations in higher-J rotational states, making it desirable to develop ESST schemes applicable to such states. Nevertheless, one cannot derive such schemes via a simple and straightforward extension of existing low-J schemes, because higher-J manifolds contain more magnetic sub-levels and involve more complicated networks of electric-dipole transitions. Here, we propose an ESST scheme for chiral molecules involving the J=1 and J=2 rotational states. Specifically, our scheme is based on enantiomer-specific pumping driven by three linearly polarized microwave fields and one laser beam. Under this scheme, one enantiomer is pumped into an enantiomer-specific dark state within a sub manifold with J=1,2, whereas the other enantiomer is dissipatively pumped out of this manifold. Our strategy can be extended to systems involving rotational states with even higher angular momenta.
ER -