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We demonstrate a single-molecule technique that is compatible with high-precision measurements and obtain the spectrum of three molecular ion species. While the current result yields a modest spectral resolution due to a broad light source, we expect the method to ultimately provide a resolution comparable to quantum logic methods with significantly less stringent requirements. Adaptations of this technique will prove useful in a wide range of precision spectroscopy arenas including the search for parity-violating effects in chiral molecules. 

Spectroscopy is a key analytical tool that provides valuable insight into molecular structure and is widely used to identify chemical samples. Tagging spectroscopy is a form of action spectroscopy in which the absorption of a single photon by a molecular ion is detected via the loss of a weakly attached, inert “tag” particle (e.g. He, Ne, N2).1–3 The absorption spectrum is derived from the tag loss rate as a function of incident radiation frequency. To date, all spectroscopy of gas phase polyatomic molecules has been restricted to large molecular ensembles, complicating spectral interpretation by the presence of multiple chemical and isomeric species. Here we present a novel tagging spectroscopic scheme to analyze the purest possible sample: a single gas phase molecule. We demonstrate this technique with the measurement of the infrared spectrum of a single tropylium (C7H7+ ) molecular ion; to our knowledge the first recorded spectrum of a single gas phase polyatomic molecule. Our method’s high sensitivity revealed spectral features previously unobserved using traditional tagging methods.4 Our approach in principle enables analysis of multi-component mixtures by identifying constituent molecules one at a time. Single molecule sensitivity extends action spectroscopy to rare samples, such as those of extraterrestrial origin,5,6 or to reactive reaction intermediates formed at number densities too low for traditional action methods. 

Non-governmental organizations for environmental conservation have a significant interest in monitoring conservation-related media and getting timely updates about infrastructure construction projects as they may cause massive impact to key conservation areas. Such monitoring, however, is difficult and time-consuming. We introduce NewsPanda, a toolkit which automatically detects and analyzes online articles related to environmental conservation and infrastructure construction. We fine-tune a BERT-based model using active learning methods and noise correction algorithms to identify articles that are relevant to conservation and infrastructure construction. For the identified articles, we perform further analysis, extracting keywords and finding potentially related sources. NewsPanda has been successfully deployed by the World Wide Fund for Nature teams in the UK, India, and Nepal since February 2022. It currently monitors over 80,000 websites and 1,074 conservation sites across India and Nepal, saving more than 30 hours of human efforts weekly. We have now scaled it up to cover 60,000 conservation sites globally.

 

ACM luminaries describe how their experiences with DEI issues vary between the different continents where they have lived. 

Straightforward identification of chiral molecules in multi-component mixtures of unknown composition is extremely challenging. Current spectrometric and chromatographic methods cannot unambiguously identify components while the state of the art spectroscopic methods are limited by the difficult and time-consuming task of spectral assignment. Here, we introduce a highly sensitive generalized version of microwave three-wave mixing that uses broad-spectrum fields to detect chiral molecules in enantiomeric excess without any prior chemical knowledge of the sample. This method does not require spectral assignment as a necessary step to extract information out of a spectrum. We demonstrate our method by recording three-wave mixing spectra of multi-component samples that provide direct evidence of enantiomeric excess. Our method opens up new capabilities in ultrasensitive phase-coherent spectroscopic detection that can be applied for chiral detection in real-life mixtures, raw products of chemical reactions and difficult to assign novel exotic species.

 

The evolution that serverless computing represents, the economic forces that shape it, why it could fail, and how it might fulfill its potential.