AMO physics · optical tweezers · quantum technology
I build experiments and tools for controlling single atoms.
I am Saumitra Phatak, a Physics Ph.D. candidate in Jonathan Hood's lab at Purdue University. My work focuses on cooling and imaging individual lithium-6 and cesium-133 atoms in optical tweezers, with the long-term goal of assembling strongly interacting LiCs molecules.
What I work on
Single-particle control for quantum science
Record-survival single-atom imaging
2000 consecutive images of a single 6Li atom using D1 Λ-enhanced gray molasses, with 99.950% per-image survival.
TheoryUnified trapped-atom cooling framework
A Lindblad master-equation model tying together polarization-gradient, gray-molasses, EIT, Λ-GM, and sideband cooling.
CesiumQuadrupole cooling and background-free imaging
685 nm electric-quadrupole excitation with vortex light and 852 nm cascade fluorescence for single Cs atoms.
Research philosophy
Fundamental AMO physics, engineered toward useful quantum hardware.
My goal is two-fold: advance basic science by arranging polar molecules in reconfigurable lattices, and refine the building blocks that fault-tolerant quantum processors will need in the coming decade. That means improving cooling protocols, making molecule assembly repeatable, and translating every gain in coherence into hardware that future quantum-software teams can actually program.
The next step is to coax one Li atom to bind with one Cs atom and create a ground-state LiCs molecule. LiCs has a permanent dipole moment of roughly 5.5 Debye, among the largest of any ground-state bialkali molecule, making it a compelling platform for dipolar many-body physics and quantum information.
Beyond the lab
Tools, teaching, writing, and projects
AMO Toolkit
14 interactive calculators, atom references, laser-cooling guides, and neutral-atom quantum-computing explainers.
Teaching & talks
Modern physics labs, AMO lecture series, and recorded talks on lithium and cesium single-atom experiments.
Writing
12 personal essays about arriving in the U.S., graduate school, travel, language, and becoming a physicist abroad.
Poetry
104 original poems in Hindi, Marathi, and English — from the Siyahi collection.
Projects
Four open-source web projects: AMO Toolkit, Siyahi, Curious Writings, and RealWorld Academy.
CV & contact
Download the current CV, find research profiles, or get in touch about AMO physics, tools, and collaborations.