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Bulletin of the American Physical Society

STIRAP Production of Rydberg Helium: Effects of Thermal Radiation and Level Multiplicity

Petr M. Anisimov, Yuan Sun, Harold J. Metcalf

Published Jun 6, 2012• 0 citations
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Producing Rydberg States of Helium Using STIRAP

Oleg Kritsun, Benjamin Dietzek, H. Metcalf

APS•May 1, 2002•0 citations

Excitation of Metastable Helium Atoms to Rydberg States by STIRAP

Oleg Kritsun, Oleksii Boiko, Harold J. Metcalf

APS•May 1, 2004•1 citation

Stimulated Raman Adiabatic Passage between Metastable and Rydberg States of Helium

Sun, Yuan

We investigate the coherent population transfer and associated effects for a three level atomic system, with the third level being a Rydberg state. The scheme adopted here is the stimulated Raman adiabatic passage (STIRAP). An atomic beam of metastable helium is orthogonally crossing two laser beams in a tunable dc electric field. The ir laser of 790 - 830 nm connects the triplet 3P state to the Rydberg states (n = 12 - 50) and the uv laser of 389 nm connects the metastable triplet 2S state to the triplet 3P state. A third laser of 1083 nm driving 2S-2P transition is applied downstream, providing a strong bichromatic force on the atoms remaining in the 2S state to deflect them, establishing the absolute count of Rydberg atoms. Rydberg atoms can be ionized by background thermal radiations at room temperature and it is observed in this experiment. This fact actually enables precise measurement, especially spectroscopy, of Rydberg atoms by simply looking at the ions, which are easy to detect. It is also confirmed that background thermal radiation could significantly redistribute the population between neighboring Rydberg states. The 2S, 3P and the final Rydberg states all have magnetic sub-levels, hence the linkage pattern of the excitation has non-trivial crossings, if the polarizations of the two lasers are not parallel to each other. Those phase differences in different excitation paths induced by the laser polarizations can lead to interference which would determine the excitation probability and the polarization of the excited atom. Theoretical calculations predict interesting interference patterns as a function of laser polarizations and Rabi frequencies. Those interference structures have been experimentally observed. Transverse velocity distribution in the atomic beam turns out to be a limiting factor in the efficiency of production of Rydberg atoms. The transverse velocity of an atom can not only induce one-photon detuning but also two-photon detuning, which could effectively reduce the STIRAP process efficiency. By adding a laser to make Doppler molasses in the transverse direction, we can heat or cool the atomic beam transversely and verify this effect. | 190 pages

•Dec 1, 2013•0 citations

Absolute Efficiency for STIRAP Excitation of Rydberg States

X. L. Lu, Yuan Sun, H. Metcalf

We have set up a STIRAP excitation mechanism for helium from the metastable 23S state into Rydberg states, via the intermediate level 33P . A uv laser at 389 nm and an ir laser at 780-815nm are used as the pump and Stokes beams respectively. Our purposes is to examine how well STIRAP works to efficiently produce the Rydberg atoms, and also to apply STIRAP for further coherent manipulations of helium. To examine the efficiency of the STIRAP process, we use the state selectivity of the light force on atoms to physically separate atoms with different internal states. We use the bichromatic force on a transition different from those used for Rydberg excitation. We do not measure an excitation efficiency close to the ~100% theoretical optimum but instead only about 50%. To gain more insight into this coherent process, an excitation path interferometer is envisioned that showes the expected interference, via the final population of the Rydberg level.

Bulletin of the American Physical Society•Jun 16, 2011•0 citations

Efficient Rydberg Excitation of He with STIRAP

S. H. Lee, Kyung Soo Choi, J. Kaufman +3 more

Bulletin of the American Physical Society•May 19, 2006•1 citation

STIRAP on helium: Excitation to Rydberg states

Deqian Yuan

Research in optically induced transitions between dierent atomic levels has a long history. For transitions between states driven by a coherent optical eld, the theoretical eciency could be ideally high as 100% but there could be many factors preventing this. In the three state helium atom excitation process, i.e. 23S! 33P! nL , the stimulated emission from intermediate state makes it hard to achieve ecient population transfer to the nal state through an intuitive excitation order. One technique to achieve a higher eciency is Stimulated Raman Adiabatic Passage (STIRAP) which is being studied and under research in our lab. Unlike traditional three level excitation processes, STIRAP actually uses a counter intuitive pulsed laser beams timing arrangement. The excitation objects are metastable helium atoms traveling in a vacuum system with a longitudinal velocity of 1070 m/s. We are using a 389 nm UV laser to connect the 23S and the 33P state and a frequency tunable 790 nm iii IR laser to connect the 33P state and the dierent Rydberg states. A third 1083 nm wavelength laser beam drives the 23S ! 23P transition to transversely separate the residual metastable atoms and the Rydberg atoms for eciency measurements. The data is taken by a stainless steel detector in the vacuum system. As the Rydberg atoms will get ionized by blackbody radiation under room temperature, we can utilize this for their detection. An ion detector sitting on the eld plate is capable to collect the ion signals of the Rydberg atoms for detection. So far the whole system has not been ready for data collection and measurement, so here we are using data and results from previous theses for discussions. The highest transition frequency that has ever been achieved in our lab is around 70% after corrections. | 144 pages

•Jan 1, 2015•0 citations
We investigate the coherent population transfer and associated effects for a three level atomic system, with the third level being a Rydberg state. The scheme adopted here is the stimulated Raman adiabatic passage (STIRAP). An atomic beam of metastable helium is orthogonally crossing two laser beams in a tunable dc electric field. The ir laser of 790 - 830 nm connects the triplet 3P state to the Rydberg states (n = 12 - 50) and the uv laser of 389 nm connects the metastable triplet 2S state to the triplet 3P state. A third laser of 1083 nm driving 2S-2P transition is applied downstream, providing a strong bichromatic force on the atoms remaining in the 2S state to deflect them, establishing the absolute count of Rydberg atoms. Rydberg atoms can be ionized by background thermal radiations at room temperature and it is observed in this experiment. This fact actually enables precise measurement, especially spectroscopy, of Rydberg atoms by simply looking at the ions, which are easy to detect. It is also confirmed that background thermal radiation could significantly redistribute the population between neighboring Rydberg states. The 2S, 3P and the final Rydberg states all have magnetic sub-levels, hence the linkage pattern of the excitation has non-trivial crossings, if the polarizations of the two lasers are not parallel to each other. Those phase differences in different excitation paths induced by the laser polarizations can lead to interference which would determine the excitation probability and the polarization of the excited atom. Theoretical calculations predict interesting interference patterns as a function of laser polarizations and Rabi frequencies. Those interference structures have been experimentally observed. Transverse velocity distribution in the atomic beam turns out to be a limiting factor in the efficiency of production of Rydberg atoms. The transverse velocity of an atom can not only induce one-photon detuning but also two-photon detuning, which could effectively reduce the STIRAP process efficiency. By adding a laser to make Doppler molasses in the transverse direction, we can heat or cool the atomic beam transversely and verify this effect. | 190 pages
We have set up a STIRAP excitation mechanism for helium from the metastable 23S state into Rydberg states, via the intermediate level 33P . A uv laser at 389 nm and an ir laser at 780-815nm are used as the pump and Stokes beams respectively. Our purposes is to examine how well STIRAP works to efficiently produce the Rydberg atoms, and also to apply STIRAP for further coherent manipulations of helium. To examine the efficiency of the STIRAP process, we use the state selectivity of the light force on atoms to physically separate atoms with different internal states. We use the bichromatic force on a transition different from those used for Rydberg excitation. We do not measure an excitation efficiency close to the ~100% theoretical optimum but instead only about 50%. To gain more insight into this coherent process, an excitation path interferometer is envisioned that showes the expected interference, via the final population of the Rydberg level.
Research in optically induced transitions between dierent atomic levels has a long history. For transitions between states driven by a coherent optical eld, the theoretical eciency could be ideally high as 100% but there could be many factors preventing this. In the three state helium atom excitation process, i.e. 23S! 33P! nL , the stimulated emission from intermediate state makes it hard to achieve ecient population transfer to the nal state through an intuitive excitation order. One technique to achieve a higher eciency is Stimulated Raman Adiabatic Passage (STIRAP) which is being studied and under research in our lab. Unlike traditional three level excitation processes, STIRAP actually uses a counter intuitive pulsed laser beams timing arrangement. The excitation objects are metastable helium atoms traveling in a vacuum system with a longitudinal velocity of 1070 m/s. We are using a 389 nm UV laser to connect the 23S and the 33P state and a frequency tunable 790 nm iii IR laser to connect the 33P state and the dierent Rydberg states. A third 1083 nm wavelength laser beam drives the 23S ! 23P transition to transversely separate the residual metastable atoms and the Rydberg atoms for eciency measurements. The data is taken by a stainless steel detector in the vacuum system. As the Rydberg atoms will get ionized by blackbody radiation under room temperature, we can utilize this for their detection. An ion detector sitting on the eld plate is capable to collect the ion signals of the Rydberg atoms for detection. So far the whole system has not been ready for data collection and measurement, so here we are using data and results from previous theses for discussions. The highest transition frequency that has ever been achieved in our lab is around 70% after corrections. | 144 pages