Longer life of atomic systems in “Nature”

| Photo by Andrzej Romański

The Polish-German team of physicists and quantum chemists, coordinated by dr. Karolina Słowik from the Institute of Physics of the Nicolaus Copernicus University, pointed to a new possibility of extending the lifetime of atomic systems in the environment of nanoantennas. The results of the research were presented in an article published in Nature Communications.

The article “Enhancement of and interference among higher order multipole transitions in molecules near a plasmonic nanoantenna” is a result of cooperation between scientists from the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. The co-authors of the Nicolaus Copernicus University are mgr. Piotr Gładysz, dr. Andrzej Kędzierski and dr. Karolina Słowik from the Faculty of Physics, Astronomy and Informatics.

The results concern the idea of using metallic nanostructures to strengthen the interaction between light and matter, in particular by opening usually inactive channels, which creates new possibilities of influencing the lifetime of quantum systems. The result can be used e.g. for the realization of quantum memory in miniaturized integrated circuits.