Rydberg Electron Wave Packets: Observing and Manipulating Electrons within an Atom – Carlos Stroud

Date: Thu. April 3rd, 2008, 4:15 pm-5:15 pm
Location: Rockefeller 301

We will review a series of calculations and experiments that my research group has carried out over the past few years in which we have used picosecond and femtosecond laser pulses to image and manipulate electrons within an atom. The electrons can be excited into localized wave packets moving in orbits almost a micrometer in diameter. They approach the classical limit of a single atom. The electrons can also be manipulated into very complex shapes in which we are literally sculpting the or writing information upon it. The electrons can also be entangled and used for quantum information storage and processing. We will also review experiments in which an electron was placed in a Schrodinger cat state, simultaneously localized in two macroscopically distinguishable states at once, and an electron is made to interfere with itself in a sort of Young’s double slit experiment within a single atom.