Single-atom manipulations in a microscopic dipole trap
G. Reymond, Nicolas Schlosser, Игорь Евгеньевич Проценко +1 more
We have realized a very small optical dipole trap that is designed to store and manipulate individual atoms. Due to the very small dipole-trap volume, a 'collisional blockade' mechanism locks the average number of trapped atoms at a value of 0.5 over a large range of loading rates. Here we describe methods to characterize the motion of a single trapped atom, and we also demonstrate the possibility of trapping two atoms individually at a short distance apart. Finally, we study theoretically the possibility to perform 'conditional quantum logic' by scattering photons from two such atoms.
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A Mathematical Physical and Engineering Sciences•Jul 15, 2003•25 citations