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arXiv:1102.1016 · Physical Review Letters

Resolved Atomic Interaction Sidebands in an Optical Clock Transition

Michael Bishof, Yige Lin, Matthew D. Swallows, Alexey Vyacheslavovich Gorshkov, Jun Ye, A. M. Rey

Published Jun 22, 2011• 23 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We report the observation of resolved atomic interaction sidebands (ISB) in the (87)Sr optical clock transition when atoms at microkelvin temperatures are confined in a two-dimensional optical lattice. The ISB are a manifestation of the strong interactions that occur between atoms confined in a quasi-one-dimensional geometry and disappear when the confinement is relaxed along one dimension. The emergence of ISB is linked to the recently observed suppression of collisional frequency shifts. At the current temperatures, the ISB can be resolved but are broad. At lower temperatures, ISB are predicted to be substantially narrower and useful spectroscopic tools in strongly interacting alkaline-earth gases.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.106.250801

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Physical Review A•Mar 12, 2012•4 citations
We report the observation of resolved atomic interaction sidebands (ISB) in the (87)Sr optical clock transition when atoms at microkelvin temperatures are confined in a two-dimensional optical lattice. The ISB are a manifestation of the strong interactions that occur between atoms confined in a quasi-one-dimensional geometry and disappear when the confinement is relaxed along one dimension. The emergence of ISB is linked to the recently observed suppression of collisional frequency shifts. At the current temperatures, the ISB can be resolved but are broad. At lower temperatures, ISB are predicted to be substantially narrower and useful spectroscopic tools in strongly interacting alkaline-earth gases.
Motivated by the ideas of using cold alkaline-earth atoms trapped in an optical lattice for realization of optical atomic clocks, we investigate theoretically the perturbative effects of atom-atom interactions on a clock transition frequency. These interactions are mediated by the dipole fields associated with the optically excited atoms. We predict resonancelike features in the frequency shifts when constructive interference among atomic dipoles occur. We theoretically demonstrate that by fine tuning the coherent dipole-dipole couplings in appropriately designed lattice geometries, the undesirable frequency shifts can be greatly suppressed.
Advances in ultra-stable lasers now permit sub-Hz resolution of optical atomic transitions. At this level, weak interactions by any ordinary scale can in fact dominate the dynamics of the interrogated atoms, even for spin polarized fermions at ultralow temperatures. Contrary to results obtained in radio frequency spectroscopy of alkali fermionic atoms, optical spectroscopy of 87 Sr and 171 Yb has revealed density dependent frequency shifts of the 1 S0 - 3 P 0 “clock” transition. Understanding interactions in these systems is necessary to improve their accuracy and stability. Moreover, such an understanding will enable optical lattice clock systems to serve as quantum simulators for open, driven, strongly-interacting quantum systems at the mesoscopic scale. In this talk we presented our progress towards a comprehensive evaluation and understanding of the interactions present during spectroscopy of the 87 Sr clock transition under various operating conditions. Our studies indicate that a mean-field solution of a master equation is sufficient to capture the many-body dynamics of alkaline earth atom clocks. Entering the regime in which a treatment beyond mean-field is required for a proper description of the clock dynamics is under immediate experimental reach.
We present detailed analyses of our recent experiment on the three-dimensional (3D) optical lattice clock with bosonic 88Sr^{88}\mathrm{Sr}88Sr atoms in which the collisional frequency shift was suppressed by applying a single-occupancy lattice. Frequency shifts in magnetically induced spectroscopy on the 1S0−−3P0{}^{1}{S}_{0}--{}^{3}{P}_{0}1S0​−−3P0​ clock transition ($\ensuremath{\lambda}=698$ nm) of 88Sr^{88}\mathrm{Sr}88Sr were experimentally investigated by referencing a one-dimensional (1D) lattice clock based on spin-polarized 87Sr^{87}\mathrm{Sr}87Sr atoms. We discuss that the clock stability is limited by the current laser stability as well as the experimental sequence of the clock operation, which may be improved to ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{y}(\ensuremath{\tau})=2\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}16}/\sqrt{\ensuremath{\tau}}$ by optimizing the cycle time of the clock operation.
We propose the use of optical lattice clocks operated with fermionic alkaline-earth atoms to study spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in interacting many-body systems. The SOC emerges naturally during the clock interrogation, when atoms are allowed to tunnel and accumulate a phase set by the ratio of the "magic" lattice wavelength to the clock transition wavelength. We demonstrate how standard protocols such as Rabi and Ramsey spectroscopy that take advantage of the sub-Hertz resolution of state-of-the-art clock lasers can perform momentum-resolved band tomography and determine SOC-induced s-wave collisions in nuclear-spin-polarized fermions. With the use of a second counterpropagating clock beam, we propose a method for engineering controlled atomic transport and study how it is modified by p- and s-wave interactions. The proposed spectroscopic probes provide clean and well-resolved signatures at current clock operating temperatures.
Abstract Effcient population transfer and motional state control are important for optical lattice clocks and precision experiments with lattice-trapped neutral atoms. Here we experimentally investigate adiabatic rapid passage (ARP) on the clock transition of a one-dimensional 87 Sr optical lattice clock and develop a mode-resolved model for ARP on motional sidebands. On the carrier transition, ARP enables robust internal-state transfer with a maximum excitation fraction of 0.98(2). On the blue motional sideband, ARP increases the maximum excitation fraction from 0.47(2) to 0.55(3), and the measured dynamics are consistently reproduced by the mode-resolved model. The model further predicts that the sideband transfer effciency can exceed 0.88 when the carrier Rabi frequency is increased to 15 kHz. Applying ARP to the red-sideband cooling reduces the axial mean vibrational occupation to approximately 0.038, corresponding to a motional ground-state population of 0.96. These results provide a quantitative basis for designing ARP excitation on motional sidebands and for optimizing sideband cooling in lattice-trapped atoms, with direct relevance to coherent state preparation in optical lattice clocks and related precision-measurement experiments in neutral atoms.
We study the influence of ultracold collisions induced by the inhomogeneous excitation on the clock-transition frequency in one- and two-dimensional shallow blue-detuned (BD) 87{}^{87}87Sr optical lattice clocks with a magic wavelength of ${\ensuremath{\lambda}}_{b}=389.889$ nm. The minimal lattice potential required to tightly confine atoms in each single lattice site is much larger than that required for a red-detuned (RD) lattice operating at ${\ensuremath{\lambda}}_{r}=813.4$ nm because of the relatively smaller magic wavelength. For a deep optical lattice, the two-body interactions of atoms in a single lattice site mainly contribute to the clock-transition frequency shift, while the intersite collisions primarily affect the collisional shift in a shallow optical lattice. For an effective misalignment angle $\ensuremath{\Delta}\ensuremath{\theta}\ensuremath{\sim}10$ mrad of the probe beam with respect to the lattice axis, the fractional collisional shifts in both one- and two-dimensional BD lattices are at the ${10}^{\ensuremath{-}16}$ level.