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Physical Review Letters

Large Area Light-Pulse Atom Interferometry

J. M. McGuirk, M. J. Snadden, Mark A. Kasevich

Published Nov 20, 2000• 157 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We report the experimental demonstration of a large area atom interferometer based on extended sequences of light pulses. We characterize the interferometer through measurement of the acceleration due to gravity and demonstrate a threefold enhancement in intrinsic acceleration sensitivity. The technique is applicable to many atom interferometer configurations, including those used for measurement of rotations, gravity gradients, and Planck's over 2pi/m.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.85.4498

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Atoms from a (87)Rb condensate are suspended against gravity using repeated reflections from a pulsed optical standing wave. Up to 100 reflections are observed, yielding suspension times of over 100 ms. The local gravitational acceleration can be determined from the pulse rate required to achieve suspension. Further, a gravitationally sensitive atom interferometer was implemented using the suspended atoms. This technique could potentially provide a precision measurement of gravity without requiring the atoms to fall a large distance.
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In this paper, we present a brief overview of atom interferometry. This field of research has developed very rapidly since 1991. Atom and light wave interferometers present some similarities but there are very important differences in the tools used to manipulate these two types of waves. Moreover, the sensitivity of atomic waves and light waves to their environment is very different. Atom interferometry has already been used for a large variety of studies: measurements of atomic properties and of inertial effects (accelerations and rotations), new access to some fundamental constants, observation of quantum decoherence, etc. We review the techniques used for coherent manipulation of atomic waves and the main applications of atom interferometers.