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Europhysics Letters (EPL)

Gravito-optical atom trap based on a conical hollow beam

Yu. B. Ovchinnikov, Inka B. Manek-Hönninger, A. I. Sidorov, Gabriela Wa̧sik, Rudolf Grimm

Published Sep 1, 1998• 31 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We demonstrate a novel optical dipole-force trap, which uses an intense blue-detuned conical hollow laser beam together with gravity to confine an ensemble of cesium atoms in a dark spatial region. Efficient cooling is provided by a 3D optical molasses in combination with inelastic reflections from the trapping field. The particular advantages of the trap are its experimental simplicity, the high loading efficiency, and a strong suppression of losses caused by ultracold collisions.

DOI
10.1209/epl/i1998-00390-9

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We demonstrate a novel optical dipole-force trap, which uses an intense blue-detuned conical hollow laser beam together with gravity to confine an ensemble of cesium atoms in a dark spatial region. Efficient cooling is provided by a 3D optical molasses in combination with inelastic reflections from the trapping field. The particular advantages of the trap are its experimental simplicity, the high loading efficiency, and a strong suppression of losses caused by ultracold collisions.
We discuss our recent experimental demonstrations of three novel atom traps which are all based on the optical dipole force in far-detuned laser light. In the gravito-optical surface trap (GOST), Cs atoms are trapped and cooled by means of an evanescent-wave mirror very closely above a dielectric surface. This trap allows for optical cooling at very high densities and provides good starting conditions for evaporative cooling to quantum degeneracy and the realization of a 2D quantum gas. The conical atom trap (CAT) uses a hollow blue-detuned laser beam in combination with gravity to trap atoms in a dark spatial region. This trap is experimentally simple and provides high loading efficiency, tight confinement, efficient sub-Doppler cooling, and strong suppression of collisional losses. The standing-wave red-detuned (STAR) trap allows one to confine atoms in a shallow optical potential at a very low photon scattering rate, and is thus an interesting tool for studies of the atomic ground-state dynamics in external electro-magnetic fields. We have studied atomic spin polarization in this trap.
We propose a novel gravito-optical atom trap composed of a blue-detuned, conical dark-hollow-beam propagating upward and the gravity field. When cold atoms are loaded into the conical dark-hollow-beam from a magnetic-optical trap and bounce inside the hollow beam, they experience an efficient hollow-beam induced Sisyphus cooling and repumping-beam induced geometric cooling. Our investigation shows that an ultracold and dense 87 Rb atomic sample with an equilibrium 3D temperature of about 1 μK can be obtained and the appearance of an optically-trapped Bose-Einstein condensation may be possible in this pure optical trap.
Summary form only given. The gravito-optical surface trap (GOST) confines cesium atoms by a blue-detuned repulsive evanescent wave (EW) in combination with gravity. Horizontal confinement is provided by the conservative optical dipole potential of a hollow, cylindrical laser beam, far blue-detuned from resonance. For preparing a very cold and dense cesium gas in the GOST, we use evanescent wave 'Sisyphus' cooling, which is based on inelastic reflections of the atoms from the EW. Using this method we have obtained a temperature of 3 /spl mu/K, which corresponds to an average distance of the atoms from the surface of 19 /spl mu/m. As a very important feature for attaining very high densities, EW cooling allows one to keep the atoms predominantly in the absolute ground state, thus avoiding trap loss by light assisted collisions.
We propose a dark gravito-optical dipole trap, for alkali atoms, consisting of a blue-detuned, pyramidal-hollow laser beam propagating upward and the gravity field. When cold atoms from a magneto-optical trap are loaded into the pyramidal-hollow beam and bounce inside the pyramidal-hollow beam, they experience efficient Sisyphus cooling and geometric cooling induced by the pyramidal-hollow beam and the weak repumping beam propagating downward. Our study shows that an ultracold and dense atomic sample with an equilibrium 3D momentum of � 3 ¯ and an atomic density above the point of Bose-Einstein condensation may be obtained in this pure optical trap. PACC: 3280P; 3380P; 4250
Summary form only given.We present a novel gravito-optical trap (GOT) consisting of a dark hollow-divergent laser beam (DHB) either from a collimated and focused doughnut beam or from the output beam of the LP/sub 01/ mode in a hollow optical fiber. The cold atoms are loaded into the DHB from a magneto-optical trap (MOT). As the atoms bounce in the DHB, they experience Sisyphus cooling and geometrical cooling induced by the blue detuned DHB and a very weak repumping beam propagating downward into the DHB. The coupling of the three-level atom and the DHB forms dressed states.