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Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics Pacific Rim (CLEO-PR)

Splitting of trapped thermal atoms for atom-chip based interferometry

Mahdi Ammar, Landry Huet, Jérôme Estève, Christoph Ira Westbrook, Isabelle Bouchoule, Jean-Paul Pocholle, Jakob Reichel, P. Rosenbusch, Christine Guerlin, Sylvain Schwartz

Published Jun 1, 2013• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We present a design of an atom interferometer using thermal atoms trapped on a chip. We point-out that such an interferometer requires highly symmetrical potentials, and we propose a splitter based on microwave potentials with two coplanar waveguides to achieve this goal.
DOI
10.1109/cleopr.2013.6600078

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Applied Physics Letters•Nov 5, 2012•11 citations
A trapped atom interferometer involving state-selective adiabatic potentials with two microwave frequencies on a chip is proposed. We show that this configuration provides a way to achieve a high degree of symmetry between the two arms of the interferometer, which is necessary for coherent splitting and recombination of thermal (i.e., noncondensed) atoms. The resulting interferometer holds promise to achieve high contrast and long coherence time, while avoiding the mean-field interaction issues of interferometers based on trapped Bose-Einstein condensates.
Summary form only given. Atom chips [1] have shown to be very successful for trapping and manipulating cold atoms. Atom interferometry in the vicinity of an atom chip has been recently achieved by coherently splitting a Bose-Einstein condensate with radiofrequency [2] and microwave [3] dressing. However, some limitations on the precision of the phase measurement occur in this case due to the phase diffusion process resulting from mean field interactions in the Bose-Einstein condensate.In this communication, we will discuss the possibility of using a thermal (i.e. non-condensed) ensemble of ultra-cold atoms trapped on an atom chip in order to create a trapped-atom interferometer with much weaker atomic interactions. In such a scheme (which can be seen as the atomic equivalent of a white light interferometer in optics), the coherence time will strongly depend on the level of symmetry that can be achieved between the potentials forming the two arms of the interferometer. For example, in a simple model of two harmonic potentials, it can be shown that a slight relative frequency difference Δω/ω can be associated with a limitation on the coherence time T given by the following expression: T≈ 2π1ίω kΘ Δω where Θ is the temperature of the atomic ensemble and k the Boltzmann constant (the latter expression being valid only for kΘ >> ! ω). For example, a relative asymmetry of 10-3 will result, for a temperature of about 1μK, to a limitation on the coherence time of 40ms, which favourably compares to what has been achieved experimentally with Bose-Einstein condensates [2]. We will then discuss how we plan to achieve, with the on-going experiment at Thales TRT [4], a splitting of the atomic cloud with the highest possible level of symmetry. The basic idea is to use internal state labelling on the so-called “clock states” of the 87Rb atom and microwave dressing [3] with two independent coplanar waveguides, each waveguide being preferentially resonant with one of the two internal states involved in the process. This way, we expect to have quasi-independent control over the two arms of the interferometer and thus to be able to achieve a coherent splitting as much symmetrical as possible.We will finally discuss the potential applications of this technique in terms of acceleration and gravity measurement with cold atoms on a chip, which could be of great interest in the future if combined, for example, with high bandwidth microelectromechanical sensors.
Summary form only given. Atom chips [1] have shown to be very successful for trapping and manipulating cold atoms. Atom interferometry in the vicinity of an atom chip has been recently achieved by coherently splitting a Bose-Einstein condensate with radiofrequency [2] and microwave [3] dressing. However, some limitations on the precision of the phase measurement occur in this case due to the phase diffusion process resulting from mean field interactions in the Bose-Einstein condensate.In this communication, we will discuss the possibility of using a thermal (i.e. non-condensed) ensemble of ultra-cold atoms trapped on an atom chip in order to create a trapped-atom interferometer with much weaker atomic interactions. In such a scheme (which can be seen as the atomic equivalent of a white light interferometer in optics), the coherence time will strongly depend on the level of symmetry that can be achieved between the potentials forming the two arms of the interferometer. For example, in a simple model of two harmonic potentials, it can be shown that a slight relative frequency difference Δω/ω can be associated with a limitation on the coherence time T given by the following expression: T≈ 2π1ίω kΘ Δω where Θ is the temperature of the atomic ensemble and k the Boltzmann constant (the latter expression being valid only for kΘ >> ! ω). For example, a relative asymmetry of 10-3 will result, for a temperature of about 1μK, to a limitation on the coherence time of 40ms, which favourably compares to what has been achieved experimentally with Bose-Einstein condensates [2]. We will then discuss how we plan to achieve, with the on-going experiment at Thales TRT [4], a splitting of the atomic cloud with the highest possible level of symmetry. The basic idea is to use internal state labelling on the so-called “clock states” of the 87Rb atom and microwave dressing [3] with two independent coplanar waveguides, each waveguide being preferentially resonant with one of the two internal states involved in the process. This way, we expect to have quasi-independent control over the two arms of the interferometer and thus to be able to achieve a coherent splitting as much symmetrical as possible.We will finally discuss the potential applications of this technique in terms of acceleration and gravity measurement with cold atoms on a chip, which could be of great interest in the future if combined, for example, with high bandwidth microelectromechanical sensors.
We have realized an interferometer using a thermal cloud of magnetically trapped rubidium 87 atoms on a chip. The interferometer resembles a Ramsey interferometer with a state selective spatial splitting of the two internal states as proposed in [M. Ammar, and al., Phys. Rev. A, 91, 053623]. The splitting is effected by microwave fields from two on-chip waveguides while the atoms remain magnetically trapped. The inferred maximum separation is 1.2±0.1 μ1.2\pm 0.1~μ1.2±0.1 μm. We observe interference fringes with a contrast around 8\% limited by velocity difference of the two interferometer states when we close the interferometer. We develop a model describing this contrast decay.
We discuss the possibility of building a matter wave interferometer using thermal (i.e. non condensed) cold atoms trapped in the vicinity of an atom chip for quantum sensing of acceleration and gravity fields with reduced mean-field effects. To maintain a satisfactory level of coherence, a high degree of symmetry is required between the two arms of such an interferometer. We discuss this point quantitatively, and describe the experimental protocol we are developing for this purpose, based on internal state labeling and on the use of two parallel coplanar waveguides deposited on top of the atom chip to selectively address the potential of each internal state through microwave dressing. We also report our recent experimental work demonstrating the possibility of achieving a magneto-optical trap with some of the beams passing through the chip.
We proposed to realize area-enclosed Raman-type atom interferometer on an atom chip based on the moving guide. Symmetrical state-dependent microwave potentials are applied to split and recombine the atoms with different internal states along the free-propagation direction of a magnetic guide, while the atoms are translated along another direction with the moving guide back and forth. For the long coherence time of the atom internal states and the moving guide scheme, compact and large area-enclosed atom gyroscope can be realized on an atom chip.