Lifetime Measurement of Cold Atoms in an Integrating Sphere

郑本昌, 成华东, 孟艳玲 +3 more

王秀梅 Wang Xiumei, 李琳 Li Lin, 孟艳玲 Meng Yanling +7 more

Jean Dalibard, Christophe Salomon

Wenzhuo Zhang, Wang Xu-Cheng, Cheng Hua-Dong +3 more

We present an experimental measurement of the lifetime of the cold 87 Rb atoms in an integrating sphere. The atoms are cooled by the diffuse light which is generated by the diffuse reflection of laser beams in the integrating sphere. Our result shows that the lifetime is primarily determined by the free fall of the cold 87 Rb atoms, and its half-life can reach 40 ms, which is suitable for many experiments, especially for a cold atom clock.

王秀梅 Wang Xiumei, Danyang Wang, Yifei Wang +8 more

SummaryDiffuse laser cooling provides a compact cold atom system for quantum precision measurement processes, especially for the integrating sphere cold atom clock. However, the laser cooling system of current integrating sphere cold atom clock is bulky and complex, which is not conductive to the miniaturization of cold atom clock. In order to make a less complex diffuse laser cooling system, we adopt the scheme to combine the fiber mirrors and the diffuse laser cooling technique. The incident laser beams are reflected by the fiber mirrors and teflon, and the atoms can be successfully cooled and detected in the miniaturized zone. The preparation of fiber mirrors and the realization of diffuse laser cooling system with a simple optical system can lay a solid foundation for further miniaturization of the overall system of integrating sphere cold atom clock in the future.