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Quantum Sensing for Navigation with Emerging Technologies

Jongmin Lee

Published Jan 1, 2023• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

PIC-Based/-Compatible Laser Systems for LPAIEnd goal is to have all lasers, modulators, amplifiers, and nonlinear optics fabricated with photonic integrated circuit (PIC) technology to enable largescale production."PIC-compatible" system is an intermediate step to demonstrate the feasibility of the architecture using commercial-off-the-shelf components.• Single 1560 nm seed laser • 1560 nm modulation [16,17] followed by amplification • Second harmonic generation (SHG) to produce 780 nm for addressing 87 Rb [18,19]Overview Light-pulse atom interferometers (LPAIs) have demonstrated excellent sensitivity to inertial forces in laboratory settings, and significant efforts are underway to apply them in real-world environments [1-5], but maintaining high performance in a dynamic environment is challenging.With the goal of elucidating a path towards fieldable sensors, we present a multifaceted approach based on a high data-rate grating magneto-optical trap (GMOT) LPAI [6], photonic-integrated-circuit (PIC) laser systems, and membrane PIC platforms for guiding atoms with evanescent-field (EF) modes.

DOI
10.2172/2432121

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Nature Communications•Sep 1, 2022•101 citations
PIC-Based/-Compatible Laser Systems for LPAIEnd goal is to have all lasers, modulators, amplifiers, and nonlinear optics fabricated with photonic integrated circuit (PIC) technology to enable largescale production."PIC-compatible" system is an intermediate step to demonstrate the feasibility of the architecture using commercial-off-the-shelf components.• Single 1560 nm seed laser • 1560 nm modulation [16,17] followed by amplification • Second harmonic generation (SHG) to produce 780 nm for addressing 87 Rb [18,19]Overview Light-pulse atom interferometers (LPAIs) have demonstrated excellent sensitivity to inertial forces in laboratory settings, and significant efforts are underway to apply them in real-world environments [1-5], but maintaining high performance in a dynamic environment is challenging.With the goal of elucidating a path towards fieldable sensors, we present a multifaceted approach based on a high data-rate grating magneto-optical trap (GMOT) LPAI [6], photonic-integrated-circuit (PIC) laser systems, and membrane PIC platforms for guiding atoms with evanescent-field (EF) modes.
We demonstrate a compact light-pulse atom interferometer (LPAI) with a high data-rate grating magneto-optical trap (GMOT) and a photonic-integrated-circuit (PIC)-compatible laser system. These efforts are aligned with one of our primary goals, LPAI operation in high-dynamic environments through ruggedization and miniaturization of the sensor head and laser systems. The compact sensor head is based on a custom vacuum package and a grating chip with fixed optical components. The high data-rate LPAI operation with a GMOT enables the operation of LPAIs in high dynamics. PIC-compatible and PIC-based laser systems are realized and used to demonstrate LPAIs towards miniature cold-atom inertial sensors. Acknowledgement This work was supported by the Laboratory Directed Research and Development program at Sandia National Laboratories and is funded under the DARPA APhI program. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-mission laboratory managed and operated by National Technology & Engineering Solutions of Sandia, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell International Inc., for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration under contract DE-NA0003525. This paper describes technical results and analysis. Any subjective views or opinions that might be expressed in the paper do not necessarily represent the view of the U.S. Department of Energy or the United States Government.
The extreme miniaturization of a cold-atom interferometer accelerometer requires the development of novel technologies and architectures for the interferometer subsystems. Here we describe several component technologies and a laser system architecture to enable a path to such miniaturization. We developed a custom, compact titanium vacuum package containing a microfabricated grating chip for a tetrahedral grating magneto-optical trap (GMOT) using a single cooling beam. In addition, we designed a multi-channel photonic-integrated-circuit-compatible laser system implemented with a single seed laser and single sideband modulators in a time-multiplexed manner, reducing the number of optical channels connected to the sensor head. In a compact sensor head containing the vacuum package, sub-Doppler cooling in the GMOT produces 15 uK temperatures, and the GMOT can operate at a 20 Hz data rate. We validated the atomic coherence with Ramsey interferometry using microwave spectroscopy, then demonstrated a light-pulse atom interferometer in a gravimeter configuration for a 10 Hz measurement data rate and T = 0 - 4.5 ms interrogation time, resulting in ΔΔΔ g / g = 2.0e-6. This work represents a significant step towards deployable cold-atom inertial sensors under large amplitude motional dynamics.
Recent advances in cold atom interferometry with optical and magnetic atom guides have set the stage for quantum inertial sensors capable of operating in dynamic environments. In this work, we present three key innovations—evanescent-field (EF) atom guides, optical nanofiber testbeds, and membrane-waveguide photonic integrated circuit (PIC) platforms—to advance EF-guided atom interferometry. First, we demonstrate EF atom guides on optical nanofiber testbeds, which serve as performance benchmarks for our membrane-waveguide PIC platforms. Second, we achieve low-power (∼5 mW) guiding of freely moving, laser-cooled 133Cs atoms in two-color, traveling-wave EF optical dipole traps at the novel, heat-efficient magic wavelengths of 793 and 937 nm (i.e., “793/937-nm EF atom guides”). Concurrently, we design and fabricate membrane-waveguide PIC platforms for these EF atom guides; in our prior work, we showed that these structures safely accommodate 4–6 times the required optical trap power under vacuum and enable dense cold atom generation via magneto-optical trapping in the vicinity of the optical wavguide for efficient loading. Third, we verify preserved atomic coherence via microwave fields and EF-coupled Doppler-free Raman beams; to our knowledge, this is the first report of coherence fringes driven by co-propagating EF-coupled Raman beams with only 150 nW of total optical power. By providing a direct comparison between optical nanofiber testbeds and membrane-waveguide PIC platforms, our results lay critical groundwork for the on-chip realization of EF-guided atom interferometry and the development of fully integrated, compact, lightweight, and low-power quantum accelerometers and gyroscopes.
Light-pulse atom interferometry has emerged as a promising approach for developing quantum inertial and gravity sensors for real-world applications, but achieving robust operation in dynamic environments without sacrificing sensitivity remains challenging. To mitigate performance degradations resulting from vibration-induced noise and mismatches in the spatial overlap between free-falling atoms and light pulses, we demonstrate a first-of-a-kind high-data-rate, high-sensitivity grating magneto-optical trap (GMOT)-based light-pulse atom interferometer (LPAI). This system uses a compact, rugged GMOT architecture, based on an in-vacuum microfabricated grating chip and a single laser-cooling beam, to enable high-data-rate GMOT-based cold-atom generation with sub-Doppler cooling. Our GMOT-based LPAI operates at high data rates (up to 100 Hz), while simultaneously achieving both high acceleration sensitivity (550 ng/rt-Hz at 20 Hz, 1.49 ug/rt-Hz at 45 Hz, and 6.31 ug/rt-Hz at 70 Hz) and good bias stability (71 ng). This compact, rugged architecture paves the way for field-deployable quantum inertial and gravity sensors in high dynamics and for time-multiplexed, multi-axis inertial sensing.
We report the current progress in the development of a compact, deployable cold-atom interferometry sensor platform towards atomic sensors for position, navigation, and time (PNT) applications. A simplified atomic sensor head with diffractive optics, an alignment-free optical package, and photonic-integrated-circuit (PIC) compatible laser architecture [1] are essential for its compactness and deployability. This cold-atom sensor platform can be generally applied to gravimeters, accelerometers, gyroscopes, and clocks, and the sensor platform includes significant engineering efforts in the development of grating-mirror magneto-optical traps (G-MOTs), custom titanium vacuum package with passive pumping, and silicon photonics multi-channel on-chip single sideband modulators.
Abstract The extreme miniaturization of a cold-atom interferometer accelerometer requires the development of novel technologies and architectures for the interferometer subsystems. We describe several component technologies and a laser system architecture to enable a path to such miniaturization. We developed a custom, compact titanium vacuum package containing a microfabricated grating chip for a tetrahedral grating magneto-optical trap (GMOT) using a single cooling beam. The vacuum package is integrated into the optomechanical design of a compact cold-atom sensor head with fixed optical components. In addition, a multichannel laser system driven by a single seed laser has been implemented with time-multiplexed frequency shifting using single sideband modulators, reducing the number of optical channels connected to the sensor head. This laser system architecture is compatible with a highly miniaturized photonic integrated circuit approach, and by demonstrating atom-interferometer operation with this laser system, we show feasibility for the integrated photonic approach. In the compact sensor head, sub-Doppler cooling in the GMOT produces 15 μK temperatures, which can operate at a 20 Hz data rate for the atom interferometer sequence. After validating atomic coherence with Ramsey interferometry, we demonstrate a light-pulse atom interferometer in a gravimeter configuration without vibration isolation for 10 Hz measurement cycle rate and T = 0 - 4.5 ms interrogation time, resulting in Δg/g = 2.0e-6. All these efforts demonstrate progress towards deployable cold-atom inertial sensors under large amplitude motional dynamics.