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Optics Letters

Three-dimensional magneto-optic trap for micro-object manipulation

Leonardo Sacconi, G. Romano, Riccardo Ballerini, Marco Capitanio, Marco De Pas, M. Giuntini, David D Dunlap, Laura Finzi, Francesco Saverio Pavone

Published Sep 1, 2001• 66 citations
Publisher

Abstract

A magneto-optic trap for micro-objects is described. Magnetic beads were trapped by optical tweezers while being rotated by a new integrated magnetic manipulator. Rotation was achieved with eight electromagnets with tip-pole geometry. The time orbital potential technique was used to achieve rotation of magnetic beads. Trapping in three dimensions and rotation of magnetic beads on three axes are demonstrated with forces up to 230 pN and force momenta of up to 10(-16)N m . A position-detection apparatus based on an interferometric scheme provides nanometer sensitivities in a few milliseconds.

DOI
10.1364/ol.26.001359

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A magneto-optic trap for micro-objects is described. Magnetic beads were trapped by optical tweezers while being rotated by a new integrated magnetic manipulator. Rotation was achieved with eight electromagnets with tip-pole geometry. The time orbital potential technique was used to achieve rotation of magnetic beads. Trapping in three dimensions and rotation of magnetic beads on three axes are demonstrated with forces up to 230 pN and force momenta of up to 10(-16)N m . A position-detection apparatus based on an interferometric scheme provides nanometer sensitivities in a few milliseconds.
Optical pumping in an alkali metal vapour produces long-standing coherences of ground state Zeeman sub-levels. These coherences produce large nonlinear magneto-optic rotation (NMOR). Techniques using optical coherences for sensitive magnetometry have been in vogue for a long time. However, the sensitivity achieved has been three orders of magnitude lower than that of a SQUID magnetometer. The NMOR technique has yielded signals having a very narrow width of a few micro-Gauss. In principle, it has been demonstrated that with NMOR magnetometers one can obtain a sensitivity matching, or better than the sensitivity of a Squid magnetometer. There are still many problems to be resolved before these magnetometers can be put to use in geomagnetic and biological applications, where small magnetic fields need to be measured.
We combine optical tweezers with feedback to impose arbitrary potentials on a colloidal particle. The feedback trap detects a particle's position, calculates a force based on an imposed “virtual potential,” and shifts the trap center to generate the desired force. We create virtual harmonic and double-well potentials to manipulate particles. The harmonic potentials can be chosen to be either weaker or stiffer than the underlying optical trap. Using this flexibility, we create an isotropic trap in three dimensions. Finally, we show that we can create a virtual double-well potential with fixed well separation and adjustable barrier height. These are accomplished at length scales down to 11 nm, a feat that is difficult or impossible to create with standard optical-tweezer techniques such as time sharing, dual beams, or spatial light modulators.
Optical traps using different configurations of optical fibers facilitate the trapping, manipulation, and characterization of particles ranging from dielectric beads, through anisotropic particles such as rare-earth doped nanorods. Here, we will introduce several such configurations, including the quasi-Bessel beam optical fiber tweezers and the optical nanofiber, and illustrate the variety of measurements that can be made depending on the configuration chosen. These optical traps provide us with unique opportunities to explore topics such as spin-orbit coupling and emission spectroscopy.
Optical traps using different configurations of optical fibers facilitate the trapping, manipulation, and characterization of particles ranging from dielectric beads, through anisotropic particles such as rare-earth doped nanorods. Here, we will introduce several such configurations, including the quasi-Bessel beam optical fiber tweezers and the optical nanofiber, and illustrate the variety of measurements that can be made depending on the configuration chosen. These optical traps provide us with unique opportunities to explore topics such as spin-orbit coupling and emission spectroscopy.
We present a novel configuration of a magneto-optical trap for cold atoms. The trap is very simple in design, employing only a small permanent magnet and an external Helmholtz bias coil. The trap's principal advantage is that the entire volume of the overlapping laser beams can be used for atom guiding and manipulation. An especially interesting effect is the rotation of the trapped atoms in circular motion as the permanent magnet is rotated. Clouds containing on the order of 2*10(6) atoms are rotated up to 60Hz forming a 5 mm diameter ring. This rotation can potentially be used in studying the behavior of cold atoms in 2-dimensional potential as well as applications for rotational sensors. We also present a classical theoretical model to simulate the experiment.