Dual optical cycling centers mounted on an organic scaffold: New insights from quantum chemistry calculations and symmetry analysis

Molecules cooled to the ultracold temperatures are desirable for applications in fundamental physics and quantum information science. However, cooling polyatomic molecules with more than six atoms has not yet been achieved. Building on the idea of an optical cycling center (OCC), a moiety supporting a set of localized and isolated electronic states within a polyatomic molecule, molecules with two OCCs (bi-OCCs) may afford a better cooling efficiency by doubling the photon scattering rate. By using quantum chemistry calculations, we assess the extent of the coupling of the two OCCs with each other and with the molecular scaffold. We show that promising coolable bi-OCC molecules can be proposed following chemical design principles.