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Physical Review A

Self-aligning recirculated crossed optical dipole trap for lithium atoms

Ming Lian, Maximillian Mrozek-McCourt, Christopher K. Angyal, Dadbeh Shaddel, Zachary J. Blogg, John R. Griffin, Ian Crawley, Ariel Sommer

Published Dec 27, 2024• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

The authors develop, numerically characterize, and experimentally test a new lens configuration that minimizes the sensitivity of a crossed-beam optical dipole trap to misalignment. This allows the trap to move and remain aligned, e.g. to bring an atomic cloud held in the trap close to a surface or field source for various applications in quantum simulation, sensing, and information processing.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.110.063121

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The authors develop, numerically characterize, and experimentally test a new lens configuration that minimizes the sensitivity of a crossed-beam optical dipole trap to misalignment. This allows the trap to move and remain aligned, e.g. to bring an atomic cloud held in the trap close to a surface or field source for various applications in quantum simulation, sensing, and information processing.
Crossed optical dipole traps (ODTs) provide three-dimensional confinement of cold atoms and other optically trappable particles. However, the need to maintain the intersection of the two trapping beams poses strict requirements on alignment stability, and limits the ability to move the trap. Here we demonstrate a novel crossed ODT design that features inherent stability of the beam crossing, allowing the trap to move and remain aligned. The trap consists of a single high-power laser beam, imaged back onto itself at an angle to form a crossed trap. Self-aligning behavior results from employing an imaging system with positive magnification tuned precisely to unity. We employ laser-cooled samples of 6^66Li atoms to demonstrate that the trap remains well-aligned over a 4.3 mm travel range along an axis approximately perpendicular to the plane containing the crossed beams. Our scheme can be applied to bring an atomic cloud held in a crossed ODT close to a surface or field source for various applications in quantum simulation, sensing, and information processing.
This project reports on loading 87-Rb in a red-detuned optical dipole trap formed by three 1560 nm crossed beams. The work describes the implementations made to the system for proper trap operation and the designed experimental sequence. The characteristics of the dipole potential are calculated to understand and optimize the trap loading process. The light-shift tomography technique is employed to map the trapping potential and to ensure the alignment of the trap beams. As a result, the experiment yielded 2 × 10^5 atoms in the optical dipole trap.
Quantum technologies extensively use laser light for state preparation, manipulation, and readout. For field applications, these systems must be robust and compact, driving the need for miniaturized and highly stable optical setups and system integration. In this work, we present a micro-integrated crossed-beam optical dipole trap setup, the µXODT, designed for trapping and cooling 87 Rb. This fiber-coupled setup operates at 1064 nm wavelength with up to 2.5 W optical power and realizes a free-space crossed beam geometry. The µXODT precisely overlaps two focused beams ( w 0 ≈ 33 µm) at their waists in a 45° crossing angle, achieving a position difference of ≤3.4 µm and a 0.998 power ratio between both beams with long-term stability. We describe the design and assembly process in detail, along with optical and thermal tests with temperatures of up to 65 °C. The system’s volume of 25 ml represents a reduction of more than two orders of magnitude compared to typically used macroscopic setups while demonstrating exceptional mechanical robustness and thermal stability. The µXODT is integrated with an 87 Rb 3D MOT setup, trapping 3 × 10 5 atoms from a laser-cooled atomic cloud, and has shown no signs of degradation after two years of operation.
We report the design and application of an optically compensated zoom lens supporting a moving optical dipole trap for transporting cold atoms. The proposed zoom lens is designed to have tunable magnification in a compact form factor which can significantly reduce the required long optical path lengths in conventional moving optical dipole trap systems. Without the need of mechanical cams for zooming, the optically compensated zoom lens has the ability to control the position of the trap along the optical axis with high precision while maintaining a constant trap depth by conserving the numerical aperture of the laser beam focus during the transport. We experimentally comprise an optically compensated zoom lens having dimensions of $\ensuremath{\lesssim}20$ cm in length, which can be readily configured to suit a wide range of desired transport lengths from 0.15 to 3 m and displacement magnifications from 7 to 100. The performance of our moving optical dipole trap is tested for a target transport length of 600 mm using a 532 nm laser beam on laser-cooled ytterbium atoms. The atoms can be transported to an adjacent vacuum chamber using this optically compensated zoom lens with $\ensuremath{\sim}89%$ efficiency.
The preparation and manipulation of single neutral atoms in optical dipole traps have important applications in quantum simulation and information. For this purpose, a single neutral atom, trapped in a static optical dipole trap which is formed by a strongly focused red-detuned far-off-resonance laser, can be transferred to a movable optical dipole trap when the movable trap crosses the static trap and the transfer efficiency can reach about 94%, meanwhile this transferred atom could be located at given position in the focal plane. This experimental result has potential applications in realizing entanglement of two individual neutral atoms in an optical dipole trap array.
Abstract We present a novel concept for a compact and robust crossed-beam optical dipole trap (cODT) based on a single lens, designed for the efficient generation of Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) under dynamic conditions. The system employs two independent two-dimensional acousto-optical deflectors (AODs) in combination with a single high-numerical-aperture lens to provide full three-dimensional control over the trap geometry, minimizing potential misalignments and ensuring long-term operational stability. By leveraging time-averaged potentials, rapid and efficient evaporative cooling sequences toward BECs are enabled. The functionality of the cODT under microgravity conditions has been successfully demonstrated in the Einstein-Elevator in Hannover, Germany, where the beam intersection was shown to remain stable throughout the microgravity phase of the flight. In addition, the system has been implemented in the sensor head of the INTENTAS project to verify BEC generation. Additional realization of one-, two-, and three-dimensional arrays of condensates through dynamic trap shaping was achieved. This versatile approach allows for advanced quantum sensing applications in mobile and space-based environments based on all-optical BECs.