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Measuring Magnetic Field Gradients using Electromagnetically Induced Transparency in Rb Vapor

Ravn M. Jenkins

Published Jan 1, 2019• 1 citation
OpenAlex

Abstract

We demonstrate a new method for measuring magnetic gradients in the presence of large constant magnetic fields using electromagnetically induced transparency in rubidium vapor. As the Earth provides a near-constant magnetic field of 25-50 µT, most measurements of small magnetic fields involve subtracting or shielding the Earth's field. Our method can measure small gradients in the presence of large magnetic fields using Electromagnetically Induced Transparency in 87Rb. By comparing the resonances of two laser beams in a dual-rail arrangement propagating through rubidium vapor in a spatially changing magnetic field, we are able to measure a constant gradient of ≥7 nT/cm and a time-varying gradient of ≥50 pT/cm, over a constant magnetic field of 35 µT.

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IEEE Transactions on Magnetics•May 30, 2019•12 citations
We demonstrate a new method for measuring magnetic gradients in the presence of large constant magnetic fields using electromagnetically induced transparency in rubidium vapor. As the Earth provides a near-constant magnetic field of 25-50 µT, most measurements of small magnetic fields involve subtracting or shielding the Earth's field. Our method can measure small gradients in the presence of large magnetic fields using Electromagnetically Induced Transparency in 87Rb. By comparing the resonances of two laser beams in a dual-rail arrangement propagating through rubidium vapor in a spatially changing magnetic field, we are able to measure a constant gradient of ≥7 nT/cm and a time-varying gradient of ≥50 pT/cm, over a constant magnetic field of 35 µT.
We demonstrate a method of measuring small constant gradients on top of a large constant background magnetic field using Electromagnetically Induced Transparency (EIT). The Earth provides a constant magnetic field of 25-50 μT, and as such, measuring much smaller magnetic fields as well as smaller gradients presents a challenge often requiring special shielding. We show that by making use of common mode noise subtraction from a dual rail setup, our measurement is insensitive to these large fields, and in theory our method does not require shielding. Our dual rail setup allows us to measure small magnetic field gradients by utilizing EIT resonances in 87Rb. In order to detect a cardio-magnetic field gradient, a magnetometer must be sensitive to gradients on the order of 10-100 pT. Our setup has been found to be sensitive to magnetic field gradients as low as 400 pT, and has the necessary bandwidth to acquire gradient fields at the rate necessary to detect features of the heart's magnetic field. We also discuss potential future work that could be done to remove the necessity of shielding and produce greater sensitivity.
This project demonstrates an optical method for measuring the strength and\ndirection of a magnetic field using electromagnetically induced transparency\n(EIT) in rubidium vapor. In rubidium atoms, the Zeeman effect causes atomic\nstates to shift when an external magnetic field is applied. The magnitude of\nthese shifts, and consequently the strength of the magnetic field, can be measured\nby recording electromagnetically induced transparency resonances with\ntuned laser fields. Furthermore, since the atom's interaction with the laser field\nis dependent on the direction of the magnetic field and the laser polarization,\nwe are able to determine the direction as well as the strength of the magnetic\nfield by analyzing relative intensities of EIT resonances. With a feasible precision\ndown to 10 picoTesla and the possibility of complete field mapping, this\nmagnetometer can be useful for medical, geophysical, and materials testing\napplications.
We present a realization of a magnetic sensor based on electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) resonances observed in hot Rb vapor using lin∥\parallel∥lin polarized dichromatic light and evaluate scalar and vector capabilities of the sensor for measuring Earth-like magnetic fields. We demonstrate scalar measurement sensitivity of 2 pT/Hz^1/2 in the 1-100~Hz spectral frequency band using a cm^3 Rb vapor cell, significantly improving the performance for such a configuration if compared with earlier measurements of large magnetic fields. By using a single linearly polarized dichromatic optical field, we are also able to determine the direction of the magnetic field with respect to the light propagation direction and polarization, taking advantage of the symmetries of the interaction scheme. We accomplish that by combining the polarization-sensitive transmission measurements and sparse sensing machine learning techniques. A path for further improvement of the sensitivity and elimination of systematic effects, such as heading error, is discussed.
We present a realization of a magnetic sensor based on electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) resonances observed in hot Rb vapor using lin∥\parallel∥lin polarized dichromatic light and evaluate scalar and vector capabilities of the sensor for measuring Earth-like magnetic fields. We demonstrate scalar measurement sensitivity of 2 pT/Hz^1/2 in the 1-100~Hz spectral frequency band using a cm^3 Rb vapor cell, significantly improving the performance for such a configuration if compared with earlier measurements of large magnetic fields. By using a single linearly polarized dichromatic optical field, we are also able to determine the direction of the magnetic field with respect to the light propagation direction and polarization, taking advantage of the symmetries of the interaction scheme. We accomplish that by combining the polarization-sensitive transmission measurements and sparse sensing machine learning techniques. A path for further improvement of the sensitivity and elimination of systematic effects, such as heading error, is discussed.
We present a realization of a magnetic sensor based on electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) resonances observed in hot Rb vapor using lin∥\parallel∥lin polarized dichromatic light and evaluate scalar and vector capabilities of the sensor for measuring Earth-like magnetic fields. We demonstrate scalar measurement sensitivity of 2 pT/Hz^1/2 in the 1-100~Hz spectral frequency band using a cm^3 Rb vapor cell, significantly improving the performance for such a configuration if compared with earlier measurements of large magnetic fields. By using a single linearly polarized dichromatic optical field, we are also able to determine the direction of the magnetic field with respect to the light propagation direction and polarization, taking advantage of the symmetries of the interaction scheme. We accomplish that by combining the polarization-sensitive transmission measurements and sparse sensing machine learning techniques. A path for further improvement of the sensitivity and elimination of systematic effects, such as heading error, is discussed.
This paper presents a novel method to measure the magnetic gradient by an Mz atomic magnetometer using a micro-fabricated shaped rubidium vapor cell. The shaped vapor cell is fabricated by a chemical foaming process. Four micro radio frequency (RF) coils are mounted on the shaped rubidium vapor cell. Magnetic fields at the four points corresponding to the RF coils along the laser beam propagation are obtained by measuring Larmor frequency of the rubidium atoms inside the vapor cell. The magnetic gradients are also acquired with the measured magnetic fields. The measurement is performed in a magnetic shield environment. A dc electrical coil is taken to produce an existed magnetic field for the measurement and the theoretical magnetic field distribution is calculated. It is demonstrated that the measured magnetic fields and magnetic gradients correspond well with the calculated ones. Results show that the absolute error of the magnetic field is less than 0.1 μT, the relative error of the magnetic field is below 0.8%, and the relative error of the magnetic gradient is below 5.5%. Results also indicate that the atomic magnetometer has a sensitivity of 5 pT/Hz1/2from 1 to 2 Hz. The Mz atomic magnetometer is potentially useful for applications requiring gradient field information.