Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:2109.15195 · New Journal of Physics

Buffer gas cooling of ions in radio-frequency traps using ultracold atoms

Eleanor Trimby, Henrik Hirzler, Henning A. Fürst, Arghavan Safavi-Naini, R. Gerritsma, Rianne S. Lous

Published Feb 22, 2022• 15 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Abstract Reaching ultracold temperatures within hybrid atom–ion systems is a major limiting factor for control and exploration of the atom–ion interaction in the quantum regime. In this work, we present results on numerical simulations of trapped ion buffer gas cooling using an ultracold atomic gas in a large number of experimentally realistic scenarios. We explore the suppression of micromotion-induced heating effects through optimization of trap parameters for various radio-frequency (rf) traps and rf driving schemes including linear and octupole traps, digital Paul traps, rotating traps and hybrid optical/rf traps. We find that very similar ion energies can be reached in all of them even when considering experimental imperfections that cause so-called excess micromotion. Moreover we look into a quantum description of the system and show that quantum mechanics cannot save the ion from micromotion-induced heating in an atom–ion collision. The results suggest that buffer gas cooling can be used to reach close to the ion’s groundstate of motion and is even competitive when compared to some sub-Doppler cooling techniques such as Sisyphus cooling. Thus, buffer gas cooling is a viable alternative for ions that are not amenable to laser cooling, a result that may be of interest for studies into cold controlled quantum chemistry and charged impurity physics.

DOI
10.1088/1367-2630/ac5759

Related papers

A New Mechanism for Sympathetic Cooling of Atoms and Ions in Atomic and Ion-Atomic Traps

V. S. Melezhik

Abstract Sympathetic cooling of a Fermi gas with a buffer gas of bosonic atoms is an efficient way to achieve quantum degeneracy in Fermi systems. However, all attempts to use this method for cooling ions until recently were ineffective because of the unremovable ion “micromotion” in electromagnetic Paul traps, which prevents the realization of a number of hot projects with cold atom-ion systems. In this regard, we propose a new efficient method for sympathetic cooling of ions: the use for this purpose of cold buffer atoms in the region of atom-ion confinement-induced resonances (CIRs) [V.S. Melezhik, Phys. Rev. A103, 53109 (2021)]. We show that the destructive effect of “micromotion” on its sympathetic cooling can, however, be suppressed in the vicinity of the atom-ion CIR. Here, the resonant blocking of a close collision of an atom with an ion also resists its heating due to “micromotion”. We investigate the effect of sympathetic cooling around CIRs in atom-ion, and atom-atom confined collisions within the quantum-quasiclassical approach using the Li–Yb+ and Li–Yb confined systems as an example. In this approach, the Schrödinger equation for a cold light atom is integrated simultaneously with the classical Hamilton equations for a hotter heavy-ion or atom during a collision. We have found the region near the atom-ion CIR where the sympathetic cooling of the ion by cold atoms is possible in a hybrid atom-ion trap. We also show that it is possible to improve the efficiency of sympathetic cooling in atomic traps by using atomic CIRs.

arXiv:2112.08081•Physics of Particles and Nuclei•Aug 1, 2022•0 citations

Theoretical models for ultracold atom-ion collisions in confined geometries

Srihari Srinivasan

Ultracold atom-ion systems have been a topic of interest for atomic physicists studying chemical reactions and since recently, the cold ion community (ion trap quantum computation and simulation). They have been looking at the possibility of using an ultracold atom gas to sympathetically cool ions since intrinsic motional modulation i.e micromotion is an inherent cause of decoherence in coherent applications of cold ions. Interest is also piqued by the possibility of using this hybrid system for studying impurity physics and to better understand ion-neutral reactions aimed at creation of molecular ions. In this thesis, we aim to study the effect of ion micromotion in atom-ion collision. As a prelude, we treat the 1D collision of a particle in a harmonic trap (ion) and a free particle (atom) using different numerical schemes. This system is of interest in its own right due to the mixed 0D-1D dimensionality. Atom-ion potential is simplified to a zero range potential all through out the work. Next we deal with a similar problem but with the trapped particle in a time dependent harmonic trap identical to an ion Paul trap. Finally we extend the study of micromotion to a model system in 3D with an ion in a 3D spherical Paul trap and a heavy atom at the trap centre. We discuss the effect micromotion has on potential applications of such a system, like a quantum phase gate.

•Mar 30, 2015•0 citations

Kinetics of a single trapped ion in an ultracold buffer gas

Christoph Zipkes, Lothar Ratschbacher, Carlo Sias +1 more

The immersion of a single ion confined by a radiofrequency (RF) trap in an ultracold atomic gas extends the concept of buffer gas cooling to a new temperature regime. The steady-state energy distribution of the ion is determined by its kinetics in the RF field rather than the temperature of the buffer gas. Moreover, the finite size of the ultracold gas facilitates the observation of back-action of the ion onto the buffer gas. We numerically investigate the system's properties depending on atom–ion mass ratio, trap geometry, differential cross-section and non-uniform neutral atom density distribution. Experimental results are well reproduced by our model considering only elastic collisions. We identify excess micromotion to set the typical scale for the ion energy statistics and explore the applicability of the mobility collision cross-section to the ultracold regime.

arXiv:1012.0304•New Journal of Physics•May 13, 2011•61 citations

Buffer gas cooling of polyatomic ions in rf multi-electrode traps

D. Gerlich, Gheorge Borodi

Cooling all degrees of freedom of a molecule, a cluster, or even a nanoparticle which is suspended in a vacuum, is an experimental challenge. Without suitable schemes, cold or ultracold chemical reactions are not feasible. Methods such as laser based preparation of very slow atoms, decelerating molecules to low velocities with electric fields or freezing molecular ions into Coulomb crystals, are generally not suitable to cool the vibrational or rotational motion of molecules. This contribution describes a new method in which a beam of slow atoms or molecules (H, He, H2, or D2) is used for cooling charged particles confined in a multi-electrode rf trap. For reaching sub-K temperatures, the fast part of a cold effusive beam is removed with a shutter before the slow remaining neutrals interact with the ion cloud. The development of a pulsed cold beam source is discussed as well as suitable methods for determining the ion temperature. A challenging application is to prepare internally cold CH5+ for spectroscopy or chemistry. New experimental results for hydrogen abstraction in collisions with slow H atoms are reported at energies of a few meV. For evaluating these measurements and for predicting effective rate coefficients at lower energies, the kinematic conditions of the slow neutral beam-ion trap arrangement have been analyzed in detail. The potential of cooling ions such as protonated methane or H3+ with slow energy selected H atoms is briefly mentioned. An interesting process is the formation of weakly bound ions such as H4+ or CH6+ via radiative or ternary association. Such ions are ideal candidates for preparing the corresponding collision complexes very close (microeV) to the dissociation continuum using infrared transitions.

Faraday Discussions•Jan 1, 2009•41 citations

Prospects of reaching the quantum regime in Li–Yb + mixtures

Henning A. Fürst, Norman Vincenz Ewald, T. Secker +3 more

Abstract We perform numerical simulations of trapped 171 Yb + ions that are buffer gas cooled by a cold cloud of 6 Li atoms. This species combination has been suggested to be the most promising for reaching the quantum regime of interacting atoms and ions in a Paul trap. Treating the atoms and ions classically, we compute that the collision energy indeed reaches below the quantum limit for a perfect linear Paul trap. We analyze the effect of imperfections in the ion trap that cause excess micromotion. We find that the suppression of excess micromotion required to reach the quantum limit should be within experimental reach. Indeed, although the requirements are strong, they are not excessive and lie within reported values in the literature. We analyze the detection and suppression of excess micromotion in our experimental setup. Using the obtained experimental parameters in our simulation, we calculate collision energies that are a factor 2–11 larger than the quantum limit, indicating that improvements in micromotion detection and compensation are needed there. We also analyze the buffer-gas cooling of linear and two-dimensional ion crystals. We find that the energy stored in the eigenmodes of ion motion may reach 10–100 μ K after buffer-gas cooling under realistic experimental circumstances. Interestingly, not all eigenmodes are buffer-gas cooled to the same energy. Our results show that with modest improvements of our experiment, studying atom–ion mixtures in the quantum regime is in reach, allowing for buffer-gas cooling of the trapped ion quantum platform and to study the occurrence of atom–ion Feshbach resonances.

arXiv:1804.04486•Journal of Physics B Atomic Molecular and Optical Physics•Aug 29, 2018•33 citations

Micromotion-Induced Limit to Atom-Ion Sympathetic Cooling in Paul Traps

Marko Cetina, Andrew T. Grier, Vladan Vuletić

We present, and derive analytic expressions for, a fundamental limit to the sympathetic cooling of ions in radio-frequency traps using cold atoms. The limit arises from the work done by the trap electric field during a long-range ion-atom collision and applies even to cooling by a zero-temperature atomic gas in a perfectly compensated trap. We conclude that in current experimental implementations, this collisional heating prevents access to the regimes of single-partial-wave atom-ion interaction or quantized ion motion. We determine conditions on the atom-ion mass ratio and on the trap parameters for reaching the s-wave collision regime and the trap ground state.

arXiv:1205.2806•Physical Review Letters•Dec 19, 2012•156 citations
Abstract Reaching ultracold temperatures within hybrid atom–ion systems is a major limiting factor for control and exploration of the atom–ion interaction in the quantum regime. In this work, we present results on numerical simulations of trapped ion buffer gas cooling using an ultracold atomic gas in a large number of experimentally realistic scenarios. We explore the suppression of micromotion-induced heating effects through optimization of trap parameters for various radio-frequency (rf) traps and rf driving schemes including linear and octupole traps, digital Paul traps, rotating traps and hybrid optical/rf traps. We find that very similar ion energies can be reached in all of them even when considering experimental imperfections that cause so-called excess micromotion. Moreover we look into a quantum description of the system and show that quantum mechanics cannot save the ion from micromotion-induced heating in an atom–ion collision. The results suggest that buffer gas cooling can be used to reach close to the ion’s groundstate of motion and is even competitive when compared to some sub-Doppler cooling techniques such as Sisyphus cooling. Thus, buffer gas cooling is a viable alternative for ions that are not amenable to laser cooling, a result that may be of interest for studies into cold controlled quantum chemistry and charged impurity physics.
Abstract Sympathetic cooling of a Fermi gas with a buffer gas of bosonic atoms is an efficient way to achieve quantum degeneracy in Fermi systems. However, all attempts to use this method for cooling ions until recently were ineffective because of the unremovable ion “micromotion” in electromagnetic Paul traps, which prevents the realization of a number of hot projects with cold atom-ion systems. In this regard, we propose a new efficient method for sympathetic cooling of ions: the use for this purpose of cold buffer atoms in the region of atom-ion confinement-induced resonances (CIRs) [V.S. Melezhik, Phys. Rev. A103, 53109 (2021)]. We show that the destructive effect of “micromotion” on its sympathetic cooling can, however, be suppressed in the vicinity of the atom-ion CIR. Here, the resonant blocking of a close collision of an atom with an ion also resists its heating due to “micromotion”. We investigate the effect of sympathetic cooling around CIRs in atom-ion, and atom-atom confined collisions within the quantum-quasiclassical approach using the Li–Yb+ and Li–Yb confined systems as an example. In this approach, the Schrödinger equation for a cold light atom is integrated simultaneously with the classical Hamilton equations for a hotter heavy-ion or atom during a collision. We have found the region near the atom-ion CIR where the sympathetic cooling of the ion by cold atoms is possible in a hybrid atom-ion trap. We also show that it is possible to improve the efficiency of sympathetic cooling in atomic traps by using atomic CIRs.
Ultracold atom-ion systems have been a topic of interest for atomic physicists studying chemical reactions and since recently, the cold ion community (ion trap quantum computation and simulation). They have been looking at the possibility of using an ultracold atom gas to sympathetically cool ions since intrinsic motional modulation i.e micromotion is an inherent cause of decoherence in coherent applications of cold ions. Interest is also piqued by the possibility of using this hybrid system for studying impurity physics and to better understand ion-neutral reactions aimed at creation of molecular ions. In this thesis, we aim to study the effect of ion micromotion in atom-ion collision. As a prelude, we treat the 1D collision of a particle in a harmonic trap (ion) and a free particle (atom) using different numerical schemes. This system is of interest in its own right due to the mixed 0D-1D dimensionality. Atom-ion potential is simplified to a zero range potential all through out the work. Next we deal with a similar problem but with the trapped particle in a time dependent harmonic trap identical to an ion Paul trap. Finally we extend the study of micromotion to a model system in 3D with an ion in a 3D spherical Paul trap and a heavy atom at the trap centre. We discuss the effect micromotion has on potential applications of such a system, like a quantum phase gate.
The immersion of a single ion confined by a radiofrequency (RF) trap in an ultracold atomic gas extends the concept of buffer gas cooling to a new temperature regime. The steady-state energy distribution of the ion is determined by its kinetics in the RF field rather than the temperature of the buffer gas. Moreover, the finite size of the ultracold gas facilitates the observation of back-action of the ion onto the buffer gas. We numerically investigate the system's properties depending on atom–ion mass ratio, trap geometry, differential cross-section and non-uniform neutral atom density distribution. Experimental results are well reproduced by our model considering only elastic collisions. We identify excess micromotion to set the typical scale for the ion energy statistics and explore the applicability of the mobility collision cross-section to the ultracold regime.
Cooling all degrees of freedom of a molecule, a cluster, or even a nanoparticle which is suspended in a vacuum, is an experimental challenge. Without suitable schemes, cold or ultracold chemical reactions are not feasible. Methods such as laser based preparation of very slow atoms, decelerating molecules to low velocities with electric fields or freezing molecular ions into Coulomb crystals, are generally not suitable to cool the vibrational or rotational motion of molecules. This contribution describes a new method in which a beam of slow atoms or molecules (H, He, H2, or D2) is used for cooling charged particles confined in a multi-electrode rf trap. For reaching sub-K temperatures, the fast part of a cold effusive beam is removed with a shutter before the slow remaining neutrals interact with the ion cloud. The development of a pulsed cold beam source is discussed as well as suitable methods for determining the ion temperature. A challenging application is to prepare internally cold CH5+ for spectroscopy or chemistry. New experimental results for hydrogen abstraction in collisions with slow H atoms are reported at energies of a few meV. For evaluating these measurements and for predicting effective rate coefficients at lower energies, the kinematic conditions of the slow neutral beam-ion trap arrangement have been analyzed in detail. The potential of cooling ions such as protonated methane or H3+ with slow energy selected H atoms is briefly mentioned. An interesting process is the formation of weakly bound ions such as H4+ or CH6+ via radiative or ternary association. Such ions are ideal candidates for preparing the corresponding collision complexes very close (microeV) to the dissociation continuum using infrared transitions.
Abstract We perform numerical simulations of trapped 171 Yb + ions that are buffer gas cooled by a cold cloud of 6 Li atoms. This species combination has been suggested to be the most promising for reaching the quantum regime of interacting atoms and ions in a Paul trap. Treating the atoms and ions classically, we compute that the collision energy indeed reaches below the quantum limit for a perfect linear Paul trap. We analyze the effect of imperfections in the ion trap that cause excess micromotion. We find that the suppression of excess micromotion required to reach the quantum limit should be within experimental reach. Indeed, although the requirements are strong, they are not excessive and lie within reported values in the literature. We analyze the detection and suppression of excess micromotion in our experimental setup. Using the obtained experimental parameters in our simulation, we calculate collision energies that are a factor 2–11 larger than the quantum limit, indicating that improvements in micromotion detection and compensation are needed there. We also analyze the buffer-gas cooling of linear and two-dimensional ion crystals. We find that the energy stored in the eigenmodes of ion motion may reach 10–100 μ K after buffer-gas cooling under realistic experimental circumstances. Interestingly, not all eigenmodes are buffer-gas cooled to the same energy. Our results show that with modest improvements of our experiment, studying atom–ion mixtures in the quantum regime is in reach, allowing for buffer-gas cooling of the trapped ion quantum platform and to study the occurrence of atom–ion Feshbach resonances.
We present, and derive analytic expressions for, a fundamental limit to the sympathetic cooling of ions in radio-frequency traps using cold atoms. The limit arises from the work done by the trap electric field during a long-range ion-atom collision and applies even to cooling by a zero-temperature atomic gas in a perfectly compensated trap. We conclude that in current experimental implementations, this collisional heating prevents access to the regimes of single-partial-wave atom-ion interaction or quantized ion motion. We determine conditions on the atom-ion mass ratio and on the trap parameters for reaching the s-wave collision regime and the trap ground state.