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Journal of Optics B Quantum and Semiclassical Optics

Reaching the quantum noise limit in a high-sensitivity cold-atom inertial sensor

Florence Leduc, Patrick Cheinet, J. Fils, Andr Clairon, N. Dimarcq, David Holleville, Philippe Bouyer, Arnaud Landragin

Published Apr 1, 2003• 53 citations

Abstract

In our high-precision atom interferometer, the measured atomic phase shift is sensitive to rotations and accelerations of the apparatus, and also to phase fluctuations of the Raman lasers. In this paper we study two principal noise sources affecting the atomic phase shift, induced by optical phase noise and vibrations of the setup. Phase noise is reduced by carrying out a phase lock of the Raman lasers after the amplification stages. We also present a new scheme to reduce noise due to accelerations by using a feed-forward on the phase of the Raman beams. With these methods, it should be possible to reach the range of the atomic quantum projection noise limit, which is about 1 mrad rms for our experiment, i.e. 30 nrad s-1 Hz-1/2 for a rotation measurement.

DOI: 10.1088/1464-4266/5/2/371

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In our high-precision atom interferometer, the measured atomic phase shift is sensitive to rotations and accelerations of the apparatus, and also to phase fluctuations of the Raman lasers. In this paper we study two principal noise sources affecting the atomic phase shift, induced by optical phase noise and vibrations of the setup. Phase noise is reduced by carrying out a phase lock of the Raman lasers after the amplification stages. We also present a new scheme to reduce noise due to accelerations by using a feed-forward on the phase of the Raman beams. With these methods, it should be possible to reach the range of the atomic quantum projection noise limit, which is about 1 mrad rms for our experiment, i.e. 30 nrad s-1 Hz-1/2 for a rotation measurement.

We report the operation of a cold-atom inertial sensor in a joint interrogation scheme, where we simultaneously prepare a cold-atom source and operate an atom interferometer in order to eliminate dead times. Noise aliasing and dead times are consequences of the sequential operation which is intrinsic to cold-atom atom interferometers. Both phenomena have deleterious effects on the performance of these sensors. We show that our continuous operation improves the short-term sensitivity of atom interferometers, by demonstrating a record rotation sensitivity of 100 nrad.s-1/√(Hz) in a cold-atom gyroscope of 11 cm2Sagnac area. We also demonstrate a rotation stability of 1 nrad.s-1after 104s of integration, improving previous results by an order of magnitude. We expect that the continuous operation will allow cold-atom inertial sensors with long interrogation time to reach their full sensitivity, determined by the quantum noise limit.

We report the operation of a cold-atom inertial sensor in a joint interrogation scheme, where we simultaneously prepare a cold-atom source and operate an atom interferometer in order to eliminate dead times [1]. This is illustrated in Fig. 1. Dead times and noise aliasing are consequences of the sequential operation which is intrinsic to cold-atom interferometers. Both phenomena have deleterious effects on the performance of these sensors. We show that our continuous operation improves the short-term sensitivity of atom interferometers, by demonstrating a record rotation sensitivity of 100 nrad.s-1/√Hz in a cold-atom gyroscope of 11 cm2Sagnac area. We also demonstrate a rotation stability of 1 nrad.s-1after 104s of integration, improving previous results by an order of magnitude [2-4]. We expect that the continuous operation will allow cold-atom inertial sensors with long interrogation time to reach their full sensitivity, determined by the quantum noise limit.

We have measured the phase shift induced by rotation of an atom interferometer at rates of $\ensuremath{-}2$ to

+2

earth rates and obtained

1%

agreement with the predicted Sagnac phase shift for atomic matter waves. The rotational rms noise of our interferometer was

42

milliearth rates for

1

sec of integration time, within

9%

of shot noise. The high sensitivity and agreement of predicted and measured behavior suggest useful future scientific applications of atom interferometers as inertial sensors.

We report on interleaved operation of a cold-atom inertial sensor, where three atomic clouds are simultaneously probed in an atom interferometer featuring 4 Hz sampling rate and interrogation time of 801 ms. Interleaving improves the inertial sensitivity by efficiently averaging vibration noise and allows us to perform dynamic rotation measurements in a so far unexplored range. We demonstrate sensitivity of 30 nrad.s-1·Hz-1/2and reach the long-term stability of 3·10-10rads-1, which competes with the best stability levels obtained with fiber-optic gyroscopes. Our work validated interleaving as a key concept for future atom-interferometry sensors probing time-varying signals, as in on-board navigation and gravity gradiometry, searches for dark matter, or gravitational wave detection.