A ug 2 01 8 Multistage Zeeman deceleration of atomic and molecular oxygen

Multistage Zeeman deceleration is a technique used to reduce the velocity of neutral molecules with a magnetic dipole moment. Here we present a Zeeman decelerator that consists of 100 solenoids and 100 magnetic hexapoles, that is based on a short prototype design presented recently [Phys. Rev. A 95, 043415 (2017)]. The decelerator features a modular design with excellent thermal and vacuum properties, and is robustly operated at a 10 Hz repetition rate. We use this decelerator to demonstrate for the first time the state-selective deceleration of atomic oxygen to final mean velocities in the 500 125 m/s range. We characterize our decelerator further with molecular oxygen, which despite its heavier mass is velocity tuned in the 350 150 m/s range. This corresponds to a maximum kinetic energy reduction of 95% and 80% for atomic and molecular oxygen, respectively. The long multistage Zeeman decelerator presented here demonstrates that the concept of using alternating hexapoles and solenoids is truly phase stable. This Zeeman decelerator is ideally suited for applications in crossed beam scattering experiments; the state-selected and velocity controlled samples of O atoms and O2 molecules are particularly relevant for studies of inelastic and reactive processes.