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arXiv:1011.5259 · Optics Letters

Microfabricated surface ion trap on a high-finesse optical mirror

Peter F. Herskind, Shannon X. Wang, Molu Shi, Yufei Ge, Marko Cetina, Isaac L. Chuang

Published Aug 5, 2011• 26 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

A novel approach to optics integration in ion traps is demonstrated based on a surface electrode ion trap that is microfabricated on top of a dielectric mirror. Additional optical losses due to fabrication are found to be as low as 80 ppm for light at 422 nm. The integrated mirror is used to demonstrate light collection from, and imaging of, a single Sr88(+) ion trapped 169±4 μm above the mirror.

DOI
10.1364/ol.36.003045

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A novel approach to optics integration in ion traps is demonstrated based on a surface electrode ion trap that is microfabricated on top of a dielectric mirror. Additional optical losses due to fabrication are found to be as low as 80 ppm for light at 422 nm. The integrated mirror is used to demonstrate light collection from, and imaging of, a single Sr88(+) ion trapped 169±4 μm above the mirror.
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This thesis describes the use of diffractive mirrors for efficient collection of photons from an ion in a modern surface Paul trap. Ion light collection is one of the important steps of most of the quantum computing and communication protocols using trapped ions and has a direct effect on the performance of these protocols. This is the first demonstration of an integrated-optic for a surface ion trap and a step towards realizing scalable quantum computing and communication using trapped ions. These mirrors are monolithically integrated onto the ground electrode of the trap. The fabrication of the mirrors has been accomplished by patterning diffraction rings on the silicon dioxide substrate of the trap chip and then coating it with aluminium to form a diffractive mirror integrated onto the electrode. We verified that the altered trap is still functional and demonstrated that thesemirrors substantially increase the efficiency of free space ion light collection and ion light single mode bre coupling. The mirror design is aberration free and we demonstrated this by obtaining near Diffraction-limited images of an ion. To measure the collection efficiency of the diffractive mirrors, we performed a single photon generation protocol based on an optical pumping scheme and one chapter of this thesis describes the implementation of this scheme.
We report a demonstration of a surface ion trap fabricated directly on a highly reflective mirror surface, which includes a secondary set of radio frequency (RF) electrodes allowing for translation of the quadrupole RF null location. We introduce a position-dependent photon scattering rate for a 174Yb+ ion in the direction perpendicular to the trap surface using a standing wave of retroreflected light off the mirror surface directly below the trap. Using this setup, we demonstrate the capability of fine-tuning the RF trap location with nanometer scale precision and characterize the charging effects of the dielectric mirror surface upon exposure to ultra-violet light.
Trapped, laser-cooled atoms and ions produce intense fluorescence of the order 107~108 photons per second. Detection of this fluorescence enables efficient measurement of the quantum state of qubits based on trapped atoms. It is desirable to collect a large fraction of the photons to make the detection faster and more reliable. Additionally, efficient fluorescence collection can improve the speed and fidelity of remote ion entanglement and quantum gates. Refractive and reflective optics, and optical cavities have all been used to collect the trapped ion fluorescence with up to about 10% efficiency. Here we show a novel ion trap design that incorporates a metallic spherical mirror as the integral part of the trap itself, being its RF electrode. The mirror geometry enables up to 35% solid angle collection of trapped ion fluorescence. The movable central pin electrode of this trap allows precise placement of the ion at the focus of the reflector. We characterize the performance of the mirror, and measure 25% collection efficiency, likely limited by the imperfections of the mirror surface. We also study the properties of the images of single ions formed by the spherical mirror and apply aberration correction with an aspherical element placed outside the vacuum system. Owing to the simplicity of its design, this trap structure can be adapted for microfabrication and integration into more complex trap architectures.
An atomic ion is trapped at the tip of a single-mode optical fiber in a cryogenic (8 K) surface-electrode ion trap. The fiber serves as an integrated source of laser light, which drives the quadrupole qubit transition of S88r+. Through in situ translation of the nodal point of the trapping field, the Gaussian beam profile of the fiber output is imaged, and the fiber-ion displacement, in units of the mode waist at the ion, is optimized to within 0.13±0.10 of the mode center despite an initial offset of 3.30±0.10. Fiber-induced charging by 125 μW of 674 nm light is observed to be ∼10 V/m at an ion height of 670 μm, with charging and discharging time constants of 1.6±0.3 s and 4.7±0.6 s, respectively. This work is of importance to large-scale, ion-based quantum information processing, where optics integration in surface-electrode designs may be a crucial enabling technology.