Welcome to the DeMille Group!
We are an atomic/molecular/optical (AMO) physics group at University of Chicago that explores frontiers of molecular, particle, and nuclear physics! Our primary themes of research are:
• Using diatomic molecules as amplifying quantum sensors of fundamental physics
• Developing new methods to produce ultracold polar molecules
• Exploiting strong dipolar interactions between long-lived molecules
Our particle and nuclear experiments are:
• small enough to fit in a single room
• sensitive enough to
—detect certain new particles with mass >> 1 TeV
—measure poorly-understood properties of the electroweak force
Our Research
ACME
electron electric dipole moment search
(leptonic CP violation,
towards understanding cosmological
matter-antimatter asymmetry)
Direct laser cooling & trapping
of polar molecules
(towards quantum degeneracy
and a strongly-correlated quantum gas)
CeNTREX
proton electric dipole moment search
(hadronic CP violation,
towards understanding cosmological
matter-antimatter asymmetry)
Assembling polar molecules
from ultracold atoms
(towards next-generation EDMs
and ultra-polar molecular arrays)
Recent News
09/26/2023
Welcome to our new undergrad Akiva Davis! Akiva will be working on the molecule assembly experiment
08/16/2023
Our postdoc, Xing Wu, is starting a new job as a professor at FRIB where he’ll be working on pioneering new techniques to make cold molecules and also using radioactive molecules to test fundamental symmetries. Congratulations Xing!
06/08/2023
Welcome to our new undergrads Ryan Rosenthal and Melchior Jean! Both Ryan and Melchior will be working on the molecule assembly experiment