Observation of Bose–Einstein condensation of dipolar molecules

Ensembles of particles governed by quantum mechanical laws exhibit intriguing emergent behaviour. Atomic quantum gases^1,2, liquid helium^3,4 and electrons in quantum materials^5–7 all exhibit distinct properties because of their composition and interactions. Quantum degenerate samples of ultracold dipolar molecules promise the realization of new phases of matter and new avenues for quantum simulation⁸ and quantum computation⁹. However, rapid losses¹⁰, even when reduced through collisional shielding techniques^11–13, have so far prevented evaporative cooling to a Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC). Here we report on the realization of a BEC of dipolar molecules. By strongly suppressing two- and three-body losses via enhanced collisional shielding, we evaporatively cool sodium–caesium molecules to quantum degeneracy and cross the phase transition to a BEC. The BEC reveals itself by a bimodal distribution when the phase-space density exceeds 1. BECs with a condensate fraction of 60(10)% and a temperature of 6(2) nK are created and found to be stable with a lifetime close to 2 s. This work opens the door to the exploration of dipolar quantum matter in regimes that have been inaccessible so far, promising the creation of exotic dipolar droplets¹⁴, self-organized crystal phases¹⁵ and dipolar spin liquids in optical lattices¹⁶.