Laser cooling of Rydberg atoms

Alisée Bouillon, Eduardo Marin-Bujedo, Matthieu Génévriez

We propose a scheme to directly laser cool Rydberg atoms by laser cooling the residual ion core within the Rydberg-electron orbit. The scheme is detailed for alkaline-earth-metal Rydberg atoms, whose ions can be easily laser cooled. We demonstrate that a closed optical cooling cycle can be found despite the perturbations caused by the Rydberg electron and that this cycle can be driven over more than 100 μs to achieve laser cooling. The cooling dynamics with and without the presence of magnetic fields are discussed in detail.

Hidekazu Hachisu

Jingzhong Guo, E. Arimondo

We present a calculation of cooling of Rydberg atoms in bichromatic standing light waves. The atoms in our model are assumed to have a cascade three-level transition scheme, with the second excited level being the Rydberg state. The cooling fields, which also excite the atoms to the Rydberg state, consist of two standing waves whose frequencies are tuned near the two transition frequencies of the cascade atomic system. It is shown that the mechanisms of Sisyphus cooling and velocity-selective coherent population trapping can co-exist in such a configuration, and under certain conditions the majority of the laser-cooled atoms are in the Rydberg state.

Tigrane Cantat-Moltrecht, Rodrigo G. Cortiñas, Brice Ravon +6 more

This work demonstrates the preparation of circular Rydberg atoms out of a gas of laser-cooled Rubidium atoms. The circular atoms are prepared within a cryogenic environment that keeps the microwave blackbody radiation as low as 11K, making the measured lifetime of the Rydberg atoms higher than the usual Rydberg levels.

C. Wesdorp