Towards the control of chemical reactions

Overcoming one of the challenges of quantum mechanics:

A major result in quantum mechanics has been achieved: for the first time, the temporal evolution of a quantum system has been manipulated through interaction with light oulses in the extreme ultraviolet (XUV). This achievement has been obtained by a team of researchers coordinated by Prof. Lukas Bruder from the University of Freiburg, in collaboration with 14 international institutes, including the Politecnico di Milano, the Institute of Photonics and Nanotechnologies of the National Research Council of Milan (CNR-IFN), the Institute of Materials Workshop of the National Research Council of Trieste (CNR-IOM), the National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN), the National Laboratories of Frascati (Rome), and the Elettra Synchrotron in Trieste.

The group discovered that it is possible to control matter at the atomic level by exploiting peculiar properties of light in the extreme ultraviolet (XUV). The experiment, recently published in the international journal Nature, made it possible to control the quantum states of matter at ultrafast time scales and its chemical properties with extreme precision. The technique was demonstrated on helium atoms: here the research team was able to manipulate the electronic energy levels, and the motion of electrons was subsequently measured.

The international research team successfully achieved the challenging goal of sculpting the amplitude, phase, and polarization of ultrashort pulses in the  XUV in order to control the behavior of atoms. This level of control enabled the enhancement of selected quantum processes while suppressing others. The experiments were conducted at the FERMI free-electron laser at Elettra Synchrotron in Trieste, one of Italy’s leading research centers.

“With this study, we have extended the so-called coherent control to the spectral regions of XUV and of X-rays. Coherent control involves using light to manipulate the evolution of chemical reactions and direct them toward desired chemical products,” explains Dr. Cristian Manzoni of CNR-IFN.

“This process, which is intrinsically a consequence of quantum physics, could allow us to use light as a chemical reagent to control reaction efficiency. This would enable the efficient production of highly specialized molecules for applications such as pharmaceuticals,” concludes prof. Giulio Cerullo from the Physics Department of Politecnico di Milano, one of the co-authors of the publication.

Journal: Nature
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-08209-y

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