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Physical Review A

Limits to the flux of a continuous atom laser

Nicholas P. Robins, Adele K. Morrison, J. J. Hope, J. D. Close

Published Sep 29, 2005• 39 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We present experimental results demonstrating that the flux of a continuous atom laser beam cannot be arbitrarily increased by increasing the strength of output coupling. We find that the continuous atom laser has large density fluctuations when the Rabi frequency becomes greater than the radial trapping frequency, due to the output coupling populating all accessible Zeeman states. In addition, we find that a state-changing output coupler for a continuous atom laser switches off as the output-coupling strength, parametrized in general by the Rabi frequency, is increased above a critical value. The numerical solution of a one-dimensional five-state Gross-Pitaevskii model for the atom laser is in good qualitative agreement with the experiment.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.72.031606

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arXiv:cond-mat/0608449•Physical Review A•May 4, 2007•12 citations
We present experimental results demonstrating that the flux of a continuous atom laser beam cannot be arbitrarily increased by increasing the strength of output coupling. We find that the continuous atom laser has large density fluctuations when the Rabi frequency becomes greater than the radial trapping frequency, due to the output coupling populating all accessible Zeeman states. In addition, we find that a state-changing output coupler for a continuous atom laser switches off as the output-coupling strength, parametrized in general by the Rabi frequency, is increased above a critical value. The numerical solution of a one-dimensional five-state Gross-Pitaevskii model for the atom laser is in good qualitative agreement with the experiment.
We present experimental results demonstrating that the flux of a continuous atom laser beam cannot be arbitrarily increased by increasing the strength of output-coupling. We find that a state changing output-coupler for a continuous atom laser switches off as the output-coupling strength, parameterized by the Rabi frequency, is increased above a critical value of four times the radial trapping frequency. In addition, we find that the continuous atom laser has large classical fluctuations when the Rabi frequency is greater than the radial trapping frequency, due to the output-coupling populating all accessible Zeeman states. The numerical solution of a one-dimensional 5-state Gross-Pitaevskii model for the atom laser is in good qualitative agreement with the experiment.
If atom lasers are to transform many fields of physics, as well as find applications in industry, the most essential development needed is increased atom flux. In this thesis we report on the experimental observation of fundamental limits on the flux of continuous atom lasers. The flux produced by the commonly used radio frequency outcoupler, can not be arbitrarily increased by increasing the strength of the outcoupling. Above a critical Rabi frequency, the atom laser shows large classical density fluctuations, due to coupling between the multiple Zeeman states. In our system this critical Rabi frequency is about 1 kHz. Futhermore, at large coupling strengths (> 4 kHz for our experimetnal parameters), the continuous atom laser output completely switches off, as a result of the atoms remaining trapped in a bound state. In addition to the investigations of the radio frequency outcoupler, we have demonstrated the first continuous Raman outcoupled atom laser. Preliminary data indicates that the Raman outcoupler will be flux limited in a similar way to the radio frequency outcoupler.
By direct comparison between experiment and theory with no adjustable parameters, we show how the classical fluctuations on a multistate atom laser beam increase with increasing flux. The fluctuations are inherent to state changing out coupling, rf, Raman, or otherwise and are likely to be present in all atom lasers, pulsed or continuous, that employ such out coupling. If not removed or avoided, these classical fluctuations will prevent shot noise limited measurement employing atom lasers of this kind.
We present a theory to derive the output rate of an atom laser consisting of an interacting Bose-Einstein condensate in a magnetic trap and two additional rf fields transferring trapped atoms to a repelled Zeeman sublevel via an intermediate untrapped Zeeman sublevel. We explicitly obtain the dependence of the output rate ${\ensuremath{\Gamma}}_{\mathrm{out}}$ on various characteristic parameters such as a coupling parameter (the Rabi frequency), the atom number density in the center of the condensate, and the strength of the atom-atom interaction.