Patrick Stollenwerk is an experimental physicist in the Physics Division at Argonne and a member of the Atom Trappers group. His research interests primarily center around the application of atomic, molecular, and optical physics techniques toward scientific questions. Currently, he is leading the development of a new detector using a cryogenic buffer gas beam source for analyzing Auger-Meitner radioisotopes, which are presently experimentally uncharacterized, but hold promise for targeted radionuclide therapy cancer treatments. He is also affiliated with Trace Radioisotope Analysis CEnterR (TRACER), a center that specializes in Atom Trap Trace Analysis (ATTA) for detecting rare noble gas isotopes, useful for radioisotope dating and other forms of environmental analysis. Patrick’s primary focus in TRACER is on developing a new method for exciting noble gas atoms into the metastable state, which is necessary for their subsequent trapping in ATTA.

Patrick received his PhD in 2020 from Northwestern University, where he worked under the guidance of Brian Odom. During his doctoral research, Patrick developed and demonstrated laser-based techniques to control the rotational and vibrational degrees of freedom of molecular ions. His work included preparation of super-rotor states where molecules rotate so rapidly that they are on the brink of dissociating, as well as cooling molecules into the lowest energy rotational state.