Optical bichromatic force deflection of a polyatomic molecule

Recently much progress has been made using radiative optical forces for direct laser cooling of diatomic molecules [1]. Our results demonstrating Sisyphus laser cooling of the triatomic free radical SrOH indicate that direct laser cooling is achievable with polyatomic molecules [2]. Moreover, SrOH serves as a test case for techniques that extend to larger molecules (e.g. SrOCH$_3$) [3]. However, spontaneous decay into dark vibrational states remains a pressing challenge, especially as one moves to more complex molecules. The bichromatic force requires fewer spontaneous decays, offers a wide velocity capture range, and promises an order of magnitude enhancement over the saturated radiative force. Recent simulations indicate that the bichromatic force persists in the complicated structure of SrOH [4,5]. We present our progress towards deflection of SrOH with the bichromatic force. We explore the prospects for longitudinal deceleration of molecular beams with an emphasis on utility for direct optical loading of a magnetic trap with complex polyatomic molecules. [1] Gadway et al. J. Phys. B 49 (2016), [2] Kozyryev et al. arXiv:1609.02254 (2016), [3] Kozyryev et al. ChemPhysChem. 17 (2016), [4] Aldridge et al. PRA 93 (2016), [5] Aldridge. PhD Thesis. U. Conn. (2016)