Physicists create giant trilobite molecules

In trilobite Rydberg molecules, an atom in its usual state is connected to a Rydberg electron (an electron in an outer orbit) in a superposition of high angular momentum states. This creates a homonuclear molecule with a permanent electric dipole moment in the kilo-debye range.

Until now, scientists had only seen trilobite molecules only with admixtures of low-l states. Kaiserslautern…