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arXiv:2301.12323 · Review of Scientific Instruments

A cavity loadlock apparatus for next-generation quantum optics experiments

Chuan Ci Yin, Henry Ando, Mark Stone, Danial Shadmany, Anna Soper, Matt Jaffe, Aishwarya Kumar, Jonathan Simon

Published Aug 1, 2023• 3 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Cavity quantum electrodynamics (QED), the study of the interaction between quantized emitters and photons confined in an optical cavity, is an important tool for quantum science in computing, networking, and synthetic matter. In atomic cavity QED, this approach typically relies upon an ultrahigh vacuum chamber that hosts a cold trapped atomic ensemble and an optical cavity. Upgrading the cavity necessitates a months-long laborious process of removing external optics, venting, replacing the resonator, baking, and replacing optics, constituting a substantial bottleneck to innovation in resonator design. In this work, we demonstrate that the flexibility of optical cavities and the quick turnaround time in switching between them can be restored with the vacuum loadlock technique-reducing the cycle time to install a cavity, bake it, and transport it into the science chamber for days, achieving 3 × 10-10 Torr pressure in the science chamber. By reducing vacuum limitations, this approach is particularly powerful for labs interested in quickly exploring novel optic cavities or any other atomic physics relying on in-vacuum optics.

DOI
10.1063/5.0145769

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Cavity quantum electrodynamics (QED), the study of the interaction between quantized emitters and photons confined in an optical cavity, is an important tool for quantum science in computing, networking, and synthetic matter. In atomic cavity QED, this approach typically relies upon an ultrahigh vacuum chamber that hosts a cold trapped atomic ensemble and an optical cavity. Upgrading the cavity necessitates a months-long laborious process of removing external optics, venting, replacing the resonator, baking, and replacing optics, constituting a substantial bottleneck to innovation in resonator design. In this work, we demonstrate that the flexibility of optical cavities and the quick turnaround time in switching between them can be restored with the vacuum loadlock technique-reducing the cycle time to install a cavity, bake it, and transport it into the science chamber for days, achieving 3 × 10-10 Torr pressure in the science chamber. By reducing vacuum limitations, this approach is particularly powerful for labs interested in quickly exploring novel optic cavities or any other atomic physics relying on in-vacuum optics.
Cavity quantum electrodynamics (cavity QED) describes electromagnetic fields in a confined space and the radiative properties of atoms in such fields. The simplest example of such system is a single atom interacting with one mode of a high-finesse resonator. Besides observation and exploration of fundamental quantum mechanical effects, this system bears a high potential for applications quantum information science such as, e.g., quantum logic gates, quantum communication and quantum teleportation. In this thesis I present an experiment on the deterministic coupling of a single neutral atom to the mode of a high-finesse optical resonator. In Chapter 1 I describe our basic techniques for trapping and observing single cesium atoms. As a source of single atoms we use a high-gradient magneto-optical trap, which captures the atoms from background gas in a vacuum chamber and cools them down to millikelvin temperatures. The atoms are then transferred without loss into a standing-wave dipole trap, which provides a conservative potential required for experiments on atomic coherence such as quantum information processing and metrology on trapped atoms. Moreover, shifting the standing-wave pattern allows us to deterministically transport the atoms (Chapter 2). In combination with non-destructive fluorescence imaging of individual trapped atoms, this enables us to control their position with submicrometer precision over several millimeters along the dipole trap. The cavity QED system can distinctly display quantum behaviour in the so-called strong coupling regime, i.e., when the coherent atom-cavity coupling rate dominates dissipation in the system. This sets the main requirements on the resonator's properties: small mode volume and high finesse. Chapter 3 is devoted to the manufacturing, assembling, and testing of an ultra-high finesse optical Fabry-Perot resonator, stabilized to the atomic transition. In Chapter 4 I present the transportation of single atoms into the cavity and their coupling to the cavity mode. The strong coupling manifests itself in a strong reduction of the cavity transmission probed by a weak external laser. The atoms remain trapped and coupled to the cavity mode for several seconds until we move them out of the cavity for final analysis of their number and position.
We present and characterize an experimental system in which we achieve the integration of an ultrahigh finesse optical cavity with a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). The conceptually novel design of the apparatus for the production of BECs features nested vacuum chambers and an in vacuo magnetic transport configuration. It grants large scale spatial access to the BEC for samples and probes via a modular and exchangeable “science platform.” We are able to produce Rb87 condensates of 5×106 atoms and to output couple continuous atom lasers. The cavity is mounted on the science platform on top of a vibration isolation system. The optical cavity works in the strong coupling regime of cavity quantum electrodynamics and serves as a quantum optical detector for single atoms. This system enables us to study atom optics on a single particle level and to further develop the field of quantum atom optics. We describe the technological modules and the operation of the combined BEC cavity apparatus. Its performance is characterized by single atom detection measurements for thermal and quantum degenerate atomic beams. The atom laser provides a fast and controllable supply of atoms coupling with the cavity mode and allows for an efficient study of atom field interactions in the strong coupling regime. Moreover, the high detection efficiency for quantum degenerate atoms distinguishes the cavity as a sensitive and weakly invasive probe for cold atomic clouds.
On the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of Albert Einstein's annus mirabilis , we reflect on the development and current state of research in cavity quantum electrodynamics in the optical domain. Cavity QED is a field which undeniably traces its origins to Einstein's seminal work on the statistical theory of light and the nature of its quantized interaction with matter. In this paper, we emphasize the development of techniques for the confinement of atoms strongly coupled to high-finesse resonators and the experiments which these techniques enable.
We show the planned upgrade of a cavity QED experimental apparatus. The system consists of an optical cavity and an ensemble of ultracold 85^{85}85Rb atoms coupled to its mode. We propose enhancements to both. First, we document the building process for a new cavity, with a planned finesse of $\sim$20000. We address problems of maintaining mirror integrity during mounting and improving vibration isolation. Second, we propose improvements to the cold atom source in order to achieve better optical pumping and control over the flux of atoms. We consider a 2-D optical molasses for atomic beam deflection, and show computer simulation results for evaluating the design. We also examine the possibility of all-optical atomic beam focusing, but find that it requires unreasonable experimental parameters.
The paradigm of cavity QED is a two-level emitter interacting with a high-quality factor single-mode optical resonator. The hybridization of the emitter and photon wave functions mandates large vacuum Rabi frequencies and long coherence times; features that so far have been successfully realized with trapped cold atoms and ions, and localized solid-state quantum emitters such as superconducting circuits, quantum dots, and color centers Reiserer and Rempe (Rev Modern Phys 87:1379, 2015), Faraon et al. (Phys Rev 81:033838, 2010). Thermal atoms, on the other hand, provide us with a dense emitter ensemble and in comparison to the cold systems are more compatible with integration, hence enabling large-scale quantum systems. However, their thermal motion and large transit-time broadening is a major bottleneck that has to be circumvented. A promising remedy could benefit from the highly controllable and tunable electromagnetic fields of a nano-photonic cavity with strong local electric-field enhancements. Utilizing this feature, here we investigate the interaction between fast moving thermal atoms and a nano-beam photonic crystal cavity (PCC) with large quality factor and small mode volume. Through fully quantum mechanical calculations, including Casimir-Polder potential (i.e. the effect of the surface on radiation properties of an atom), we show, when designed properly, the achievable coupling between the flying atom and the cavity photon would be strong enough to lead to quantum interference effects in spite of short interaction times. In addition, the time-resolved detection of different trajectories can be used to identify single and multiple atom counts. This probabilistic approach will find applications in cavity QED studies in dense atomic media and paves the way towards realizing large-scale, room-temperature macroscopic quantum systems aimed at out of the lab quantum devices.
Cavity quantum electrodynamics (QED) studies the interaction between atoms and a single electromagnetic mode. When the atoms form a degenerate quantum gas, the resulting lightâ matter interaction reflects the underlying quantum statistics of the particles. Recently, degenerate Fermi gases have been coupled to optical cavities, enabling the exploration of strongly correlated fermionic systems with interactions mediated by cavity photons. Remarkably, when disorder is introduced into such systems, the resulting model realizes fermions with random, long-range interactions characteristic of the Sachdevâ Yeâ Kitaev Hamiltonian. This platform therefore offers a possible route toward the experimental investigation of holographic duality, linking strongly interacting quantum matter to black hole physics through the AdS/CFT correspondence. As a step toward realizing this model, we developed a new technology: the cavity microscope. This device combines the strong light-matter coupling of cavity QED with the micrometer-scale spatial resolution provided by high-numerical-aperture optics. This thesis presents the operation and the first experimental results obtained with this new platform. First, the high-resolution addressing capability of the cavity microscope was used to locally modify the level structure of thermal atoms within the cavity mode. This allowed us to extract spatially resolved information about the atomic density from a global cavity measurement. In doing so, we overcome a longstanding limitation of cavity QED experiments, where the spatial structure of the light-matter interaction is typically fixed by the cavity mode and cannot be freely tuned. Second, we implemented a tightly focused optical trap that enabled the extraction of a small degenerate Fermi gas from a larger atomic cloud, coupled to the cavity mode. We then systematically investigated the light-matter interaction between this tweezer-trapped Fermi gas and the cavity mode by studying the superradiant phase transition of atoms in the cavity. We find that the transition can be either facilitated or suppressed by the fermionic occupation of phase space. The crossover between these two regimes occurs when the scattering wavevector becomes approximately twice the Fermi wavevector, revealing the crucial role of Fermi statistics in cavity-mediated interactions. These results pave the way toward the deterministic preparation of few-fermion systems inside an optical cavity, enabling the study of finite-size and trap-filling effects in cavity QED. In an upgraded version of the cavity microscope, the number of atoms can approach the cavity cooperativity, bringing the system into a new regime where entanglement can extend across the entire ensemble. Finally, by introducing time-dependent randomization of cavity-mediated interactions, this platform could realize low-rank SYK models, opening the door to experimental investigations of fast scrambling, thermalization, and quantum chaos in strongly interacting quantum matter.