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International Conference on Optical Fiber Sensors (OFS)

Atomic Spin Precession Detection with Fiber Optic Saganc Interferometer

Dongying Chen, Yuanhong Yang, Wei Jin

Published Jan 1, 2021• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We propose and experimentally demonstrate an atomic spin precession detection technique using a modified reflective closed-loop fiber-optic Saganc interferometer with circularly polarized light. Preliminary tests for the measurements of magnetic field and rotation rate based on the polarized K-Rb-21Ne comagnetometer achieve a magnetic field sensitivity of 1.2 pT/Hz1/2 and a rotation sensitivity about 1.65×10−5 rad/s/Hz1/2, respectively. The nonlinear response of the atomic gyroscope is also investigated.

DOI
10.1364/ofs.2020.f1.4

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We propose and experimentally demonstrate an atomic spin precession detection technique using a modified reflective closed-loop fiber-optic Saganc interferometer with circularly polarized light. Preliminary tests for the measurements of magnetic field and rotation rate based on the polarized K-Rb-21Ne comagnetometer achieve a magnetic field sensitivity of 1.2 pT/Hz1/2 and a rotation sensitivity about 1.65×10−5 rad/s/Hz1/2, respectively. The nonlinear response of the atomic gyroscope is also investigated.
Spin-exchange relaxation-free atomic spin gyroscope (SERF gyro) has ultrahigh theoretical sensitivity and is regarded as one of the most potential atomic gyroscopes. To investigate its rotation response, a high linear atomic spin precession detection module was developed firstly by modifying the fiber reflective Sagnac interferometer for atomic spin precession detection and operating it in closed-loop mode. The SERF gyro based on K-Rb-21Ne comagnetometer was built and tested and appeared obvious nonlinear response feature. The nonlinear rotation response model was deduced by assuming the rotation-induced nuclei spin procession detecting as an in-situ magnetometer inside the SERF gyro and the fitting curves are in good agreement with the experimental results. The optimized pump power for maximum sensitivity and measurable dynamic range were analyzed theoretically and demonstrated experimentally. The investigation results show that the nonlinear rotation response is an intrinsic property of SERF gyro and its measurable dynamic range is limited due to the saturation characteristic of the sum of pumping and relaxation rate. This indicates that SERF gyro is propitious to a position gyroscope with high sensitivity.
We describe a dual-axis atomic spin comagnetometer for rotation sensing using a single laser beam. A circularly polarized laser is used to pump the co-located atomic ensembles of alkali metal and noble gas and probe their gyroscopic precession at the same time, which is different from the traditional two-beam orthogonal pump-probe configuration. Combined with magnetic field modulations perpendicular to the laser propagating direction, the comagnetometer could measure dual-axis rotation rates simultaneously. This system is demonstrated theoretically and experimentally. A rotation sensitivity of 5.1 × 10–7 rad s−1 Hz−1∕2 and a bias instability of 0.016 °/h have been achieved. The theory and method presented here shed light on the way to miniaturize the comagnetometer with high precision for practical applications.
We describe a nuclear spin gyroscope based on an alkali-metal--noble-gas comagnetometer. Optically pumped alkali-metal vapor is used to polarize the noble-gas atoms and detect their gyroscopic precession. Spin precession due to magnetic fields as well as their gradients and transients can be cancelled in this arrangement. The sensitivity is enhanced by using a high-density alkali-metal vapor in a spin-exchange relaxation free regime. With a $\mathrm{K}\mathrm{\text{\ensuremath{-}}}^{3}\mathrm{He}$ comagnetometer we demonstrate rotation sensitivity of $5\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}7}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{rad}\text{ }{\mathrm{s}}^{\ensuremath{-}1}\text{ }{\mathrm{Hz}}^{\ensuremath{-}1/2}$, equivalent to a magnetic field sensitivity of 2.5  fT/Hz1/22.5\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{fT}/{\mathrm{Hz}}^{1/2}2.5  fT/Hz1/2. The rotation signal can be increased by a factor of 10 using 21Ne^{21}\mathrm{Ne}21Ne with a smaller magnetic moment. The comagnetometer is also a promising tool in searches for anomalous spin couplings beyond the standard model.
A new method for the detection of atomic spin precession based on the Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI) is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. Different from the conventional polarization detection methods which obtain the atomic spin precession signal by measuring the change of the probe laser power, the proposed method uses the laser modulated by an electro-optic phase modulator (EOM) as the source of the interferometer, and obtains the atomic spin precession signal by measuring the phase difference between the two arms of the MZI. The output of interferometer is independent of the probe laser power, which avoids the system error caused by the fluctuation of the probe laser power, and the long-term stability of the system is effectively improved. At the same time, the method adopts high-frequency electro-optic modulation, which can effectively suppress low-frequency noise, such as 1/f noise, and can significantly improve the detection sensitivity. The rotation sensitivity and long-term stability of the atomic comagnetometer were tested using the MZI detection method and a typical detection method, respectively. The comparison results show that the proposed method has the highest low frequency sensitivity and the potential to improve the long-term stability of the system.
A self-oscillating magnetometer based on nonlinear magneto-optical rotation using amplitude-modulated pump light and unmodulated probe light (AM-NMOR) in 87Rb has been constructed and tested towards a goal of airborne detection of magnetic anomalies. In AM-NMOR, stroboscopic optical pumping via amplitude modulation of the pump beam creates alignment of the ground electronic state of the rubidium atoms. The Larmor precession causes an ac rotation of the polarization of a separate probe beam; the polarization rotation frequency provides a measure of the magnetic field. An anti-relaxation coating on the walls of the atomic vapor cell results in a long lifetime of 56 ms for the alignment, which enables precise measurement of the precession frequency. Light is delivered to the magnetometer by polarization-maintaining optical fibers. Tests of the sensitivity include directly measuring the beat frequency between the magnetometer and a commercial instrument and measurements of Earth's field under magnetically quiet conditions, indicating a sensitivity of at least 5 pT/νHz. Rotating the sensor indicates a heading error of less than 1 nT, limited in part by residual magnetism of the sensor.
We report a rubidium atomic magnetometer based on pump-probe nonlinear magneto-optical rotation. The rubidium vapor cell is placed in a five-layer magnetic shield with inner coils that can generate uniform magnetic fields along the direction of pump beam, and the cell is also placed in the center of a Helmholtz coil that can generate an oscillating magnetic field perpendicular to the direction of pump beam. The atoms are optically pumped by circularly polarized pump beam along a constant magnetic field in a period of time, then the pump beam is turned off and a /2 pulse of oscillating magnetic field for 87Rb atoms is applied. After the above process, the individual atomic magnetic moments become phase coherent, resulting in a transverse magnetization vector precessing at the Larmor frequency in the magnetic field. The linearly polarized probing beam is perpendicular to the direction of magnetic field, and can be seen as a superposition of the left and right circularly polarized light. Because of the different absorptions and dispersions of the left and right circularly polarized light by rubidium atoms, the polarization direction of probing beam rotates when probing beam passes through rubidium vapor cell. The rotation of the polarization is subsequently converted into an electric signal through a polarizing beam splitter. Finally, the decay signal related to the transverse magnetization vector is measured. The Larmor frequency proportional to magnetic field is obtained by the Fourier transform of the decay signal. The value of magnetic field is calculated from the formula:B=(2/) f, where and f are the gyromagnetic ratio and Larmor frequency, respectively. In order to measure the magnetic field in a wide range, the tracking lock mode is proposed and tested. The atomic magnetometer can track the magnetic field jump of 1000 nT or 10000 nT, indicating that the atomic magnetometer has strong locking ability and can be easily locked after start-up. The main performances in different magnetic fields are tested. The results show that the measurement range of the atomic magnetometer is from 100 nT to 100000 nT, the extreme sensitivity is 0.2 pT/Hz1/2, and the magnetic field resolution is 0.1 pT. The transverse relaxation times of the transverse magnetization vector in different magnetic fields are obtained, and the relaxation time decreases with the increase of the magnetic field. When the measurement range is from 5000 nT to 100000 nT, the magnetic field sampling rate of the atomic magnetometer can be adjusted in a range from 1 Hz to 1000 Hz. The atomic magnetometer in high sampling rate can measure weak alternating magnetic field at low frequency. This paper provides an important reference for developing the atomic magnetometer with large measurement range, high sensitivity and high sampling rate.