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Applied Physics Express

A Modified Route to Creating Bose–Einstein Condensates of Sodium Atoms

Kou Matsui, Hiromitsu Imai, Hironobu Yamaoka, Ryuichi Makabe, Katsuki Furuta, Atsuo Morinaga

Published Feb 20, 2009• 3 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Bose–Einstein condensates of dilute gaseous sodium atoms were achieved by Zeeman slowing, dual-operation magneto-optical trapping (MOT), temporal dark MOT, polarization gradient cooling, direct confinement in a compressed magnetic field and radio-frequency-induced forced evaporative cooling. The dependence of the temperature of the phase transition on the radial curvature of the magnetic field was studied.

DOI
10.1143/apex.2.032301

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Bose–Einstein condensates of dilute gaseous sodium atoms were achieved by Zeeman slowing, dual-operation magneto-optical trapping (MOT), temporal dark MOT, polarization gradient cooling, direct confinement in a compressed magnetic field and radio-frequency-induced forced evaporative cooling. The dependence of the temperature of the phase transition on the radial curvature of the magnetic field was studied.
We describe the setup to create a large Bose-Einstein condensate containing more than 120 x 10(6) atoms. In the experiment a thermal beam is slowed by a Zeeman slower and captured in a dark-spot magneto-optical trap (MOT). A typical dark-spot MOT in our experiments contains 2.0 x 10(10) atoms with a temperature of 320 microK and a density of about 1.0 x 10(11) atoms/cm(3). The sample is spin polarized in a high magnetic field before the atoms are loaded in the magnetic trap. Spin polarizing in a high magnetic field results in an increase in the transfer efficiency by a factor of 2 compared to experiments without spin polarizing. In the magnetic trap the cloud is cooled to degeneracy in 50 s by evaporative cooling. To suppress the three-body losses at the end of the evaporation, the magnetic trap is decompressed in the axial direction.
We have developed an apparatus for creating Bose–Einstein condensates of sodium atoms. Radio-frequency-induced forced evaporative cooling was studied experimentally and optimized to stably create sodium condensates containing a large number of atoms. The transition temperature, the spatial distribution of the condensate, and the aspect ratio of the Bose–Einstein condensate were analyzed quantitatively and compared with theoretical predictions. Several methods of ramping down the rf for evaporative cooling were tested.
The advent of the laser opened the way to the development of powerful new methods for manipulating and cooling atoms which were exploited in the realization of Bose–Einstein condensation in alkali atom vapours. To set the stage we describe a typical experiment, which is shown schematically in Fig. 4.1. A beam of sodium atoms emerges from an oven at a temperature of about 600 K, corresponding to a speed of about 800 m s –1 , and is then passed through a so-called Zeeman slower, in which the velocity of the atoms is reduced to about 30 m s –1 , corresponding to a temperature of about 1 K. In the Zeeman slower, a laser beam propagates in the direction opposite that of the atomic beam, and the radiation force produced by absorption of photons retards the atoms. Due to the Doppler effect, the frequency of the atomic transition in the laboratory frame is not generally constant, since the atomic velocity varies. However, by applying an inhomogeneous magnetic field designed so that the Doppler and Zeeman effects cancel, the frequency of the transition in the rest frame of the atom may be held fixed. On emerging from the Zeeman slower the atoms are slow enough to be captured by a magneto-optical trap (MOT), where they are further cooled by interactions with laser light to temperatures of order 100 μK. Another way of compensating for the changing Doppler shift is to increase the laser frequency in time, which is referred to as ‘chirping’. In other experiments the MOT is filled by transferring atoms from a second MOT where atoms are captured directly from the vapour.
We have achieved Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) [1,2] of Na atoms in an anisotropic TOP trap [3]. Our TOP trap has a bias field that rotates (at 20 kHz) in a plane containing the symmetry access of the quadrapole field, resulting in an anisotropic, time-averaged TOP potential with spring constants in the ratio of 1:2:4. A dark spot MOT is loaded from a Zeeman-cooled Na beam and the cloud of atoms are cooled in dark optical molasses. This produces a sample of −1010 atoms, mainly in the F = 1 hyperfine ground state at a temperature of −100 pK. We transfer about 1/3 of these atoms into a static quadrapole trap, trapping the F = 1, mF=−1 state. The quadrapole trap is stiffened to 1000 G/cm to increase the Na density and evaporated for 3 seconds with a linearly swept rf field. The TOP field is then turned on quickly to 150 G, producing a weak TOP trap. Further evaporation is performed by reducing the TOP field to 20 G, bringing in the circle of death. This 15 second evaporation period is followed by 10 seconds of rf induced evaporation, with BEC occuring at a temperature of ~1 μK, producing a condensate of ~3×106 atoms. By subsequently adiabatically expanding the trapping potential, we have reduced the temperature to −50 nK.
We reported a simple scheme of producing Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) in a dimple trap. Starting from a regular magneto-optical trap (MOT), we apply a temporal dark MOT to increase the atom density and directly load atoms into a crossed dipole trap. In order to make the trap frequency relatively high at the end of evaporation, a tight dimple is added. Such a scheme ensures relatively high trap volume for loading atoms and high trap frequency for evaporative cooling. The BEC phase transition is observed after 12 s evaporation. Furthermore, we demonstrated the manipulation of the hyperfine states with a Raman coupling, which is very useful for studying many-body physics via Ramsey or spin-echo spectroscopy.
Summary form only given.We have established an experimental and theoretical program focused on understanding photon atom interactions in condensates with the aim of probing the properties of condensates as well as testing our models of the interactions themselves. With a combination of laser and evaporative cooling, we are routinely creating million atom Bose-Einstein condensates of sodium atoms in the newly designed 4D magnet. Our experimental setup incorporates a candlestick atomic beam source, which provides for recirculation of uncollimated sodium atoms, The laser cooling step involves a zero-crossing Zeeman slower, magneto-optic trap, and polarization gradient cooling. The laser-cooled atom cloud is loaded into the 4D magnetic trap and adiabatically compressed to high density and an evaporative cooling process is initiated. Using a RF magnetic resonance technique, hot atoms are ejected through magnetic spin flips. After formation of the condensate in the tightly confining trap, we manipulate the condensate by adiabatically changing the trapping potential and through interaction with photons. We have developed a technique for probing the condensates directly inside the trap using near-resonant absorption imaging. This imaging technique gives high sensitivity to details of the condensate wavefunction and to its surface structure. Images of pure condensates are compared to calculations of the condensate wavefunction based on a Hartree mean field description of the two-body interaction between condensate atoms.