Rational Pulse Design for Enantiomer-Selective Microwave
Three-Wave Mixing

Abstract

Microwave three-wave mixing allows for enantiomer-selective excitation of randomly
oriented chiral molecules into rotational states with different energy. The random 
orientation of molecules is reflected in the degeneracy of the rotational spectrum 
with respect to the orientational quantum number M and reduces, if not accounted 
for, enantiomer-selectivity. Here, we show how to design pulse sequences with 
maximal enantiomer-selectivity from an analysis of the M-dependence of the 
Rabi frequencies associated with rotational transitions induced by resonant 
microwave drives. We compare different excitations schemes for rotational transitions 
and show that maximal enantiomerselectivity at a given rotational temperature is 
achieved for synchronized three-wave mixing with circularly polarized fields.