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A Crystal Lattice Controls a Quantum Conversion
Raising hydrogen concentration reorganizes strain and phonons until an otherwise enabled nuclear-spin transition is suppressed.
Summary
Raising hydrogen concentration reorganizes strain and phonons until an otherwise enabled nuclear-spin transition is suppressed.
Isolated molecular hydrogen cannot directly convert between its ortho and para nuclear-spin states, but a surrounding solid can connect them. Rotationally resolved infrared spectroscopy in crystalline carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide at 10 kelvin found that increasing hydrogen concentration slowed conversion by nearly an order of magnitude and fully suppressed it at 20 percent loading in the tested systems. Simulations attribute the change to both the phonon modes available for relaxation and strain-driven clustering that removes molecules from the enabling crystal field. The experiment links a classical collective response of the host lattice to microscopic quantum-state dynamics.
Why it matters
Raising hydrogen concentration reorganizes strain and phonons until an otherwise enabled nuclear-spin transition is suppressed.
Limits and context
- Isolated molecular hydrogen cannot directly convert between its ortho and para nuclear-spin states, but a surrounding solid can connect them.
Key claims
Raising hydrogen concentration reorganizes strain and phonons until an otherwise enabled nuclear-spin transition is suppressed.
Qualification: Isolated molecular hydrogen cannot directly convert between its ortho and para nuclear-spin states, but a surrounding solid can connect them.
Evidence: source-2026-11-09-011
Sources
- arXiv preprint 2611.09850, original v1arXiv · primary research
Corrections
No corrections have been recorded for this story.