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Optics Letters

Enhanced fully optically pumped magnetic resonance with optical sideband auxiliary pumping

Zhiyuan Jiang, Xiaochi Liu, Pingwei Lin, Jifeng Qu, Hongping Liu

Published Dec 17, 2019• 7 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We have proposed a new technique to obtain highly polarized atoms for improving the sensitivity of the all-optical Cs atomic magnetometer. In a Bell–Bloom magnetometer, the resonance pumping from the ground state F g = 3 to the excited state F e = 4 at the D1 line is used to polarize the Cs atoms and populate the sublevels of the | F g = 4 , m F = 4 ⟩ partly as the transition F g = 4 → F e = 3 remains leaking. Here we utilize a modulation technique to generate a sideband frequency to pump both transitions simultaneously, which drives more atoms to the target state | F g = 4 , m F = 4 ⟩ . This improvement significantly increases the magnetic resonance signal but with little effect on its linewidth. It is very suitable for the miniaturization of the atomic magnetometer in the future.

DOI
10.1364/ol.45.000105

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Applied Optics•Jan 17, 2019•29 citations
We have proposed a new technique to obtain highly polarized atoms for improving the sensitivity of the all-optical Cs atomic magnetometer. In a Bell–Bloom magnetometer, the resonance pumping from the ground state F g = 3 to the excited state F e = 4 at the D1 line is used to polarize the Cs atoms and populate the sublevels of the | F g = 4 , m F = 4 ⟩ partly as the transition F g = 4 → F e = 3 remains leaking. Here we utilize a modulation technique to generate a sideband frequency to pump both transitions simultaneously, which drives more atoms to the target state | F g = 4 , m F = 4 ⟩ . This improvement significantly increases the magnetic resonance signal but with little effect on its linewidth. It is very suitable for the miniaturization of the atomic magnetometer in the future.
In order to availably solve the crosstalk of the traditionally optically pumped magnetometer,in which an oscillating magnetic field drives transitions between Zeeman magnetic sublevels,an all-optical cesium(Cs)atomic magnetometer based on Bell-Bloom structure has been investigated and demonstrated experimentally in this paper.When there is an external magnetic field,by analyzing the Larmor precession spectrum of the polarized ground state atoms induced by a modulated pump laser,the atomic magnetometer with high sensitivity is achieved.First,we present the operating principle of the magnetometer with amplitude modulation and set up the experimental system by means of a three-layer magnetic shield.Then in the case of 100 nT field by optimizing the experimental parameters,i.e.,the frequency and intensity of the pump laser,we have obtained the atomic precession spectrum with line width(full width at half maximum)of 22 Hz and signal noise ratio(SNR)of 3.2×104 per unit hertz band width,and then have evaluated the magnetometer with an intrinsic sensitivity of 100fT/Hz1/2 and spatial resolution smaller than 1.2cm,while the experimentally closed loop test shows that the cesium atomic magnetometer would have the sensitivity of 120fT/Hz1/2 and response time of 300 ms.
Introduction Soon after the development of optical magnetometers based on the radio-optical double resonance method (see Chapter 4), it was realized by Bell and Bloom [1] that an alternative method for optical magnetometry was to modulate the light used for optical pumping at a frequency resonant with the Larmor precession of atomic spins. In a Bell-Bloom optical magnetometer, circularly polarized light resonant with an atomic transition propagates through an atomic vapor along a direction transverse to a magnetic field B . Atomic spins immersed in B precess at the Larmor frequency Ω L , and when the light intensity is modulated at Ω m = Ω L , a resonance in the transmitted light intensity is observed. The essential ideas of the Bell–Bloom optical magnetometer are reviewed in Chapter 1 (Section 1.2), and can be summarized in terms of what Bell and Bloom termed optically driven spin precession: in analogy with a driven harmonic oscillator, in a magnetic field B atomic spins precess at a natural frequency equal to Ω L and the light acts as a driving force oscillating at the modulation frequency Ω m . From another point of view, the Bell-Bloom optical magnetometer can be described in terms of synchronous optical pumping: when Ω m = Ω L , there is a “stroboscopic” resonance in which atoms are optically pumped into a spin state stationary in the frame rotating with Ω L . Depending on the details of the atomic structure, the spin state stationary in the rotating frame can be either a dark state that does not interact with the modulated light or a bright state for which the strength of the light–atom interaction is increased.
The D1 line spectrally selective pumping process in Doppler-broadened cesium is analyzed by solving the optical Bloch equations. The process, described by a three-level model with the A scheme, shows that the saturation intensity of broadened atoms is three orders of magnitude larger than that of resting atoms. The 丨Fg = 3) →丨Fe = 4) resonance pumping can result in the ground state丨Fg = 4, mF = 4) sublevel having a maximum population of 0.157 and the population difference would be about 0.01 in two adjacent magnetic sublevels of the hyperfine (HF) state Fg = 4. To enhance the anisotropy in the ground state, we suggest employing dichromatic optical HF pumping by adding a laser to excite D1 line 丨Fg = 4) → 丨Fe = 3) transition, in which the cesium magnetometer sensitivity increases by half a magnitude and is unaffected by the nonlinear Zeeman effect even in Earth's average magnetic field.
The D1 line spectrally selective pumping process in Doppler-broadened cesium is analyzed by solving the optical Bloch equations. The process, described by a three-level model with the Λ scheme, shows that the saturation intensity of broadened atoms is three orders of magnitude larger than that of resting atoms. The |Fg = 3〉 → |Fe = 4〉 resonance pumping can result in the ground state |Fg = 4, mF = 4〉 sublevel having a maximum population of 0.157 and the population difference would be about 0.01 in two adjacent magnetic sublevels of the hyperfine (HF) state Fg = 4. To enhance the anisotropy in the ground state, we suggest employing dichromatic optical HF pumping by adding a laser to excite D1 line |Fg = 4〉 → |Fe = 3〉 transition, in which the cesium magnetometer sensitivity increases by half a magnitude and is unaffected by the nonlinear Zeeman effect even in Earth's average magnetic field.
The ultrasensitive magnetometer has a vital importance in fundamental research and applications. Currently, the spin-exchange relaxation-free (SERF) atomic magnetometer has been reported with a sensitivity around the level of fT/Hz 1/2 . To enhance the sensitivity, a gradiometer configuration has usually been introduced to cancel the common-mode noise between two separate channels. However, the signal and response from different channels are not the same due to the attenuation of the pump beam. Here, we proposed a counter-propagating optical sideband pumping method to polarize the atoms, using the electro-optic modulator to modulate the single-pump beam, generating two symmetrically red- and blue-detuned sidebands of frequency. This scheme leads to a significant reduction of undesirable effects coming along with the optical pumping, such as light shifts and spatial inhomogeneity in atomic spin polarization. With the help of this pumping scheme, the two channels have the same magnetic response, and we have built a gradiometer atomic magnetometer with a sensitivity of 0.5 fT/Hz 1/2 ranging from 5 to 40 Hz. Our results propose the possibility of creating larger arrays of atomic magnetometers (AMs) with high sensitivity and spatial resolution based on single-vapor cells for magnetocardiography and magnetoencephalography imaging or searching for exotic spin-dependent interactions.
A high-sensitivity optically pumped atomic magnetometer working in the geomagnetic range utilizing the light-narrowing effect and in-phase excitation is described. The setup is based on a simple pump–probe arrangement built around a Cs vapor cell whose active volume is 64 mm3. The transverse oscillating field is applied parallel to the probe beam to drive Zeeman resonance, and the in-phase component of the resonance signal is measured to determine the field. The sensitivity of the magnetometer is improved by pumping most atoms into the stretched state. Consequently, spin-exchange relaxation is suppressed, and a sensitivity of 0.1 pT/Hz1/2 in the range of 10 μT is achieved. This magnetometer has the advantages of large dynamic range, high performance of low-frequency stabilization, high response speed, and compact size. It can be used for many cutting-edge applications such as detection of magnetic anomalies.