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Atomic motion in a misaligned retroreflected standing wave

Yuzhu Wang, Liang Liu, Weiquan Cai, Yudan Cheng

Published May 21, 1990• 0 citations
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Abstract

We report an experimental and theoretical study of the atomic motion in a misaligned retroreflected standing wave field. We measured the momentum transferred to an atomic beam by the misaligned laser beams. The geometry of the experiment is shown in Fig. 1. Suppose the moving angle of the atom is 2η and the misaligned angle between the two laser beams is 2θ; then the Doppler frequency shifts for the two beams are KV sin(η − θ) and —KV sin(η + θ), where K is the module of the propagating vectors K1 and K2, and V is the velocity of the atom.

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We report an experimental and theoretical study of the atomic motion in a misaligned retroreflected standing wave field. We measured the momentum transferred to an atomic beam by the misaligned laser beams. The geometry of the experiment is shown in Fig. 1. Suppose the moving angle of the atom is 2η and the misaligned angle between the two laser beams is 2θ; then the Doppler frequency shifts for the two beams are KV sin(η − θ) and —KV sin(η + θ), where K is the module of the propagating vectors K1 and K2, and V is the velocity of the atom.
This work discusses the effect of a high-intensity standing wave laser field on the motion of neutral atoms moving with a relatively high velocity. The analysis involves a detailed calculation of the force acting on the atoms and the calculation of the diffusion tensor associated with the fluctuations of the quantum force operator. The high-intensity laser field limit corresponds to a Rabi frequency much greater than the natural rate of the atom. The general results are valid for any atomic velocity. Results are then specialized to the case of slow and fast atoms where the Doppler shift of the laser frequency due to the atomic motion is either smaller or larger than the natural decay rate of the atom. The results obtained for the force and diffusion tensor are applied to a particular ideal experiment that studies the evolution of a fast atomic beam crossing a high-intensity laser beam. The theories developed previously, for a similar laser configuration, discuss only the low atomic velocities case and not the more realistic case of fast atoms. Here, an approximate solution of the equation for the distribution is obtained. Starting from the approximate distribution function, the deflection angle and dispersion angle for themore » atomic beam with respect to the free motion are calculated.« less
The diffraction of sodium atoms from a standing wave of near-resonant light is studied as a function of the atomic velocity component along the k vector of the wave. A simple theory is presented which quantitatively predicts the observed diffraction patterns and the decrease of the rms momentum transfer to the atoms with increasing velocity. This decrease results from the dephasing between the two counterpropagating traveling waves due to the first-order Doppler shift. In addition, these measurements have resolved the previous discrepancy between theory and experiment concerning the overall momentum transferred by a standing wave.
The interaction of a beam of two level atoms with a standing wave laser field has been the subject of extensive investigation in recent times. A standing wave perpendicular to an atomic beam allows the manipulation of the transverse velocity distribution. The interaction of an atomic beam with a strong standing wave laser field has been systematically investigated by both theoretical simulation and experiment in this thesis. We have developed a numerical model based on a continued fraction solution for the light pressure forces to simulate the near perpendicular interaction of an atomic beam with a strong standing wave laser field. The reshaping of the transverse spatial profile of an atomic beam by a perpendicular, near resonant, standing wave laser field is investigated for red detunings using a longitudinal velocity selective detection system. The experimental dependence of the reshaped profile on the longitudinal and transverse atomic velocities agrees well with a continued fraction solution for the light force. In particular, a regime is found where channelling of the atoms near the antinodes of the standing wave produces a central peak in the spatial distribution of the atomic beam in the far field which have also been observed elsewhere.