Atom Michelson Interferometer on a Chip Using a Bose-Einstein Condensate
Ying-Ju Wang, Dana Z. Anderson, Victor M. Bright +7 more
An atom Michelson interferometer is implemented on an "atom chip." The chip uses lithographically patterned conductors and external magnetic fields to produce and guide a Bose-Einstein condensate. Splitting, reflecting, and recombining of condensate atoms are achieved by a standing-wave light field having a wave vector aligned along the atom waveguide. A differential phase shift between the two arms of the interferometer is introduced by either a magnetic-field gradient or with an initial condensate velocity. Interference contrast is still observable at 20% with an atom propagation time of 10 ms.
arXiv:cond-mat/0407689•Physical Review Letters•Mar 11, 2005•385 citations