Wave–particle duality of C60 molecules

Arndt, Markus; Nairz, Olaf; Vos-Andreae, Julian; Keller, Christoph A.; Zouw, Gerbrand van der; Zeilinger, Anton

doi:10.1038/44348

Cited by 1,139 publications

(1,073 citation statements)

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“…Compared to our earlier molecular far-field experiments 6 , we have improved the source economy by a factor of 1000, reduced the grating thickness and the corresponding van der Waals phase shift by a factor of 16 and increased the detection efficiency to the level of single molecules.…”

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confidence: 92%

Real-time single-molecule imaging of quantum interference

et al. 2012

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The observation of interference patterns in double-slit experiments with massive particles is generally regarded as the ultimate demonstration of the quantum nature of these objects. Such matter-wave interference has been observed for electrons 1 , neutrons 2 , atoms 3,4 and molecules [5][6][7] and it differs from classical wave-physics in that it can even be observed when single particles arrive at the detector one by one. The build-up of such patterns in experiments with electrons has been described as the "most beautiful experiment in physics" [8][9][10][11] . Here we show how a combination of nanofabrication and nanoimaging methods allows us to record the full two-dimensional build-up of quantum diffraction patterns in real-time for phthalocyanine molecules PcH2 and their tailored derivatives F24PcH2 with a mass of 1298 amu. A laser-controlled micro-evaporation source was used to produce a beam of molecules with the required intensity and coherence and the gratings were machined in 10-nm thick silicon nitride membranes to reduce the effect of van der Waals forces. Wide-field fluorescence microscopy was used to detect the position of each molecule with an accuracy of 10 nm and to reveal the build-up of a deterministic ensemble interference pattern from stochastically arriving and internally hot single molecules.When Richard Feynman described the double-slit experiment with electrons as "at the heart of quantum 2 physics" 12 he was emphasizing the fundamentally non-classical nature of the superposition principle which allows the quantum wave function associated with a massive object to be widely delocalized, while the object itself is always observed as a well-localized particle. Several recent experiments contributed to a further sharpening of the discussion by demonstrating the stochastic build-up of interferograms 11,13 , by implementing double-slit diffraction in the time-domain 14,15 , even down to the attosecond level 16 , and by identifying a single molecule as the smallest double-slit for electron interference 17,18 that enables fundamental decoherence studies 19 . The extension of far-field diffraction 20 to large molecules requires a sufficiently intense and coherent beam of slow and neutral molecules, a nanosized diffraction grating and a detector with both a spatial accuracy of a few nanometers and a molecule specific detection efficiency of close to 100 %. Our present experiment solves all these tasks simultaneously, using advanced micro-preparation, nanodiffraction and nanoimaging technologies. It thus exposes the quantum wave-particle duality in a particularly clear way and opens the way to new studies with ever larger molecules in an ongoing exploration of the quantumclassical borderline.Our setup is shown in Figure 1. It is divided into three parts: the beam preparation, coherent manipulation and detection. We need to prepare the molecules such that each of them interferes with itself and that all of them lead to similar interference patterns on the screen. Since the transverse and longitudina...

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confidence: 92%

Real-time single-molecule imaging of quantum interference

et al. 2012

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“…"It is the choice of the measuring apparatus that defines whether a specific object is quantum or classical, " says Anton Zeilinger of the University of Vienna. His team provided an example of this nine years ago, when it demonstrated quantum interference between beams of C 60 fullerene molecules 8 -hardly as classical as the footballs they resemble, but nonetheless big molecules that can be seen with an electron microscope. Interference -the addition or cancellation of overlapping waves -is in this case a purely quantum effect, and can't be understood if the molecules are viewed as discrete particles.…”

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confidence: 99%

Physics: Quantum all the way

Ball¹

2008

Nature

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“…The particle's neutrality is also an important criterion in efforts to establish new beam methods for quantum interferometry with molecular matter waves [6][7][8][9] as well as for precision metrology on large molecules [10][11][12]. Neutral molecules are much better isolated from any electromagnetic environment and they may therefore propagate coherently, without noticeable perturbation, even in a rather noisy field environment.…”

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Gas-phase formation of large neutral alkaline-earth metal tryptophan complexes

Marksteiner

Haslinger

Sclafani

et al. 2008

J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom.

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We report on the first observation of isolated large neutral metal amino acid complexes such as TrpnMek, with Me == Ca, Ba, Sr, cluster combinations covering n = 1. ..33, k = 0..2 and masses beyond 6500 u. The cluster beam is generated using UV laser desorption from a mixed powder of alkaline-earth metal salts and tryptophan inside a cluster mixing chalU1el. The particles are detected using VUV photoionization followed by time-of-flight mass spectroscopy. The enhanced stability of metal amino acid clusters over pure amino acid clusters is substantiated in molecular dynamics simulations by determining the gain in binding energy related to the inclusion of the metal atoms. . The majority of studies so far focused on the generation and use of ionic species. Our work, presented here, focuses on the gas-phase formation of neutral biomolecular clusters as did already some very early studies in the field [1]. Such experiments are often motivated by the desire to better identify the role of solvation and desolvation for the relative importance of various binding forces in organic clusters and molecules [5].The particle's neutrality is also an important criterion in efforts to establish new beam methods for quantum interferometry with molecular matter waves [6-9] as well as for precision metrology on large molecules [10][11][12]. Neutral molecules are much better isolated from any electromagnetic environment and they may therefore propagate coherently, without noticeable perturbation, even in a rather noisy field environment.Biomolecular clusters are exciting study objects for future matter wave experiments as they permit one to scale the mass in well-defined steps, while at the same time changing the internal properties in an intriguing way: the number of possible conformations as well as the number of allowed configurational and vibrational transitions scales exponentially with the size of the cluster [13], and it is still an open question how this will affect de Broglie interferometry [14], which formally considers only the center of mass motion alone. (19]. But it has still remained a challenge to find reproducible methods for photoionizing biomolecules and complexes with masses exceeding 3000 u [17,20,21].The formation and photo-detection of small amino acid [22] and nucleotide clusters [23], both hydrated and solvent-free, were already reported for objects up to 1400 u. Ultracold small bioclusters can be formed by pick-up in helium nano-droplets [24]. Complexes formed between metal atoms and amino acids were also studied to understand their structure [25], their fragmentation pathways [26,27], and metal ion affinities [28].Here we extend these investigations to much larger organometallic complexes composed of up to more than 30 tryptophan molecules with masses exceeding 6500 u, that can still be detected using VUV photoionization and time-of-flight mass spectrometry. ExperimentalWe generate the molecular macroclusters using pulsed laser evaporation and collisional cooling: the pulsed beam of aNd:YAG laser (Quantel...

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Wave–particle duality of C60 molecules

Cited by 1,139 publications

References 20 publications

Real-time single-molecule imaging of quantum interference

Real-time single-molecule imaging of quantum interference

Physics: Quantum all the way

Gas-phase formation of large neutral alkaline-earth metal tryptophan complexes

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