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Europhysics Letters (EPL)

Observation of the Magneto-Optical Radiation Force by Laser Spectroscopy

Johannes Söding, Rudolf Grimm, J. Kowalski, Yu. B. Ovchinnikov, A. I. Sidorov

Published Sep 15, 1992• 12 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We report on the experimental investigation of the stimulated magneto-optical radiation force using a laser-spectroscopic method, where we detect the effect of the atom-field interaction on the transmitted laser light. The results both demonstrate the applicability of this new method and confirm all basic properties expected for the novel force from theory.

DOI
10.1209/0295-5075/20/2/002

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We report on the experimental investigation of the stimulated magneto-optical radiation force using a laser-spectroscopic method, where we detect the effect of the atom-field interaction on the transmitted laser light. The results both demonstrate the applicability of this new method and confirm all basic properties expected for the novel force from theory.
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We present both a theoretical and experimental study of the magneto-optical spectra induced with intensity-modulated resonant laser light that synchronously pumps and detects the metastable 4He^{4}\mathrm{He}4He atoms in the presence of a quasistatic magnetic field. We extend previous work and derive complete analytical expressions for the resonance signals by taking into account arbitrary magnetic-field directions and arbitrary light polarizations. The analytical results are derived by solving the Liouville equation using the irreducible tensor formalism on the assumption of low light power. We discuss the potential application of the derived analytical results in constructing and optimizing a dead-zone-free all-optical atomic magnetometer.
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This paper presents an experimental demonstration of light-induced evaporative cooling in a magneto-optical trap. An additional laser is used to interact with atoms at the edge of the atomic cloud in the trap. These atoms get an additional force and evaporated away from the trap by both the magnetic field and laser fields. The remaining atoms have lower kinetic energy and thus are cooled. It reports the measurements on the temperature and atomic number after the evaporative cooling with different parameters including the distance between the laser and the centre of the atomic cloud, the detuning, the intensity. The results show that the light-induced evaporative cooling is a way to generate an ultra-cold atom source.
We present the results of an experimental investigation of the control of atomic beam motion by the light pressure of laser radiation. Collimation, focusing, and reflection of the atomic beam are considered. Collimation of the atomic beam is achieved by the interaction of laser radiation with atoms, when the light pressure force depends only on the atom’s velocity. A similar regime of atomic beam interaction with radiation was performed with transversal irradiation of a beam by the axis-symmetrical field. The axis-symmetrical field was formed by laser radiation reflected from the conical mirror surface of a reflecting axicon. The axis of the atomic beam coincided with that of the axicon. The collimation regime was reached under negative detuning of the laser radiation frequency from the atomic transition frequency by a value equal to several homogeneous widths. With positive detuning by the same value the regime of beam decollimation was observed.