Accumulating NH radicals in a magnetic trap

Abstract

We propose a scheme to accumulate fermionic or bosonic NH radicals ${(}^{14}\mathrm{NH}$ or ${}^{15}\mathrm{NH},$ respectively) in a magnetic trap in order to increase phase-space density. NH molecules prepared in a long-lived metastable state that exhibits a large Stark effect can be brought to a standstill using Stark deceleration. By applying an intense laser field, the NH radicals can then be forced to spontaneously decay to the electronic ground state. In the ground state the NH molecules are no longer sensitive to electric fields but show a significant Zeeman effect instead, enabling confinement and reloading of ground-state molecules in a magnetic trap.