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JOURNAL OF SHENZHEN UNIVERSITY SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING

Stability optimization based on high-resolution spatial thermal distribution of a single 174Yb+ ion

Haipo NIU, Pengcheng ZHENG, Qiyin HUANG, Zerui HUANG, Songqian ZHANG, Peiliang Liu

Published May 1, 2025• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Trapped ion systems play a vital role in fields such as quantum information processing and optical frequency standards. Low-energy, highly stable trapped ions enable precise quantum manipulation and significantly reduce Doppler effect. However, ion heating presents a major challenge to maintaining such stability. In our work, a high-magnification optical imaging system is employed to achieve micron-level resolution imaging of a single 174Yb+ ion crystal. By analyzing the ion's spatial thermal distribution and applying an adaptive Gaussian filtering technique, the root mean square linewidth is accurately extracted, enabling accurate temperature measurements. Experimentally, the temperature (or energy) of a single 174Yb+ ion is progressively reduced from 1 400 mK to 260 mK. Various heating mechanisms become increasingly apparent as the ion temperature decreases. These findings provide a foundation for further optimization of ion stability. This study not only presents a practical approach for evaluating and reducing the temperature of trapped ions, thereby improving their stability, but also paves the way for exploring other ion heating effects.

DOI
10.3724/sp.j.1249.2025.03357

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Trapped ion systems play a vital role in fields such as quantum information processing and optical frequency standards. Low-energy, highly stable trapped ions enable precise quantum manipulation and significantly reduce Doppler effect. However, ion heating presents a major challenge to maintaining such stability. In our work, a high-magnification optical imaging system is employed to achieve micron-level resolution imaging of a single 174Yb+ ion crystal. By analyzing the ion's spatial thermal distribution and applying an adaptive Gaussian filtering technique, the root mean square linewidth is accurately extracted, enabling accurate temperature measurements. Experimentally, the temperature (or energy) of a single 174Yb+ ion is progressively reduced from 1 400 mK to 260 mK. Various heating mechanisms become increasingly apparent as the ion temperature decreases. These findings provide a foundation for further optimization of ion stability. This study not only presents a practical approach for evaluating and reducing the temperature of trapped ions, thereby improving their stability, but also paves the way for exploring other ion heating effects.
We present a technique based on high resolution imaging to measure the absolute temperature and the heating rate of a single ion trapped at the focus of a deep parabolic mirror. We collect the fluorescence light scattered by the ion during laser cooling and image it onto a camera. Accounting for the size of the point-spread function and the magnification of the imaging system, we determine the spatial extent of the ion, from which we infer the mean phonon occupation number in the trap. Repeating such measurements and varying the power or the detuning of the cooling laser, we determine the heating rate induced by any kind of effect other than photon scattering. In contrast to other established schemes for measuring the heating rate, the ion is always maintained in a state of thermal equilibrium at temperatures close to the Doppler limit.
Abstract We present a technique based on high resolution imaging to measure the absolute temperature and the heating rate of a single ion trapped at the focus of a deep parabolic mirror. We collect the fluorescence light scattered by the ion during laser cooling and image it onto a camera. Accounting for the size of the point-spread function and the magnification of the imaging system, we determine the spatial extent of the ion, from which we infer the mean phonon occupation number in the trap. Repeating such measurements and varying the power or the detuning of the cooling laser, we determine the heating rate induced by any kind of effect other than photon scattering. In contrast to other established schemes for measuring the heating rate, the ion is always maintained in a state of thermal equilibrium at temperatures close to the Doppler limit.
We demonstrate millikelvin thermometry of laser-cooled trapped ions with high-resolution imaging. This equilibrium approach is independent of the cooling dynamics and has lower systematic error than Doppler thermometry, with ±5 mK accuracy and ±1 mK precision. We used it to observe the highly anisotropic dynamics of a single ion, finding temperatures of <60 mK and >15 K simultaneously along different directions. This thermometry technique can offer new insights into quantum systems sympathetically cooled by ions, including atoms, molecules, nanomechanical oscillators and electric circuits.
By measuring the frequencies emitted as atoms transition between energy levels, atomic frequency standards are among the most advanced devices available for keeping time. Here, we report our recent progress in developing an optical frequency standard based on a single171Yb+. With the laser Doppler cooling, a single ytterbium ion is cooled to crystallization and the temperature of the ion crystal is estimated to be below 1 mK. The progress reported in this paper is the first step of the project and paves the way for future development.
Single ion frequency standards have demonstrated in several experiments excellent results and are approaching fractional frequency uncertainties of 10^-18. As dominant contributions to the uncertainty are linked to the ion trap properties a further reduction would be possible by an improved ion trap. Due to the interrogation of a single ion these frequency standards are currently limited by the intrinsically low signal-to-noise ratio and require long averaging times on the order of several days. This limitation is critical for various applications that require a high frequency resolution on short timescales. One possibility to improve the clock stability is to increase the number of clock ions. However, this approach further increases the requirements for the ion trap. Therefore, for the realization of a multi-ion clock that aims at simultaneously reducing the frequency stability and uncertainty the control over the characteristics of the ion trap is crucial. This thesis continues previous work towards the realization of a multi-ion optical clock based on ion Coulomb crystals of 115In+ ions which are sympathetically cooled by 172Yb+ ions. The existing design for a segmented linear ion trap has been refined and a reliable trap manufacturing process for a trap based on gold coated aluminium nitride wafers has been developed. Manufacturing tolerances below 10 μm allowed to reduce the axial micromotion amplitudes substantially. For a region of more than 300 μm the uncertainty contribution of the three-dimensional micromotion amplitude is shown to be below 10^-19. Additionally the radial ion heating rate of the trap has been measured to be 1.1 phonons/s for a trap frequency of 490 kHz. The time dilation shift due to the heating rate on the radial trap axis is found to be (2.1 ± 0.3) x 10^-20 1/s. The trap design has also been optimized for a low trap temperature rise due to the applied rf voltage. Trap temperature measurements with Pt100 sensors installed on the trap showed a maximum temperature increase of 1.21 K at an rf voltage amplitude of 1 kV. By comparing the measurement results to FEM simulations the uncertainty contribution of the trap temperature to the black-body radiation shift has been deduced to be 2.4 x 10^-20. As the ion trap provides a high level of control on Coulomb crystals it also provides an ideal test bed for studying atomic many-body systems. This work presents results of the investigations on topological defects in two-dimensional Coulomb crystals. The emphasis was placed on the effects of mass defects and external electric fields on the stability of the topological defects. It is shown that these effects can be used to manipulate and create topological defects deterministically.
Trapped atomic ions are the leading candidate to act as individual quantum bits in a large quantum information processing system. Ion traps can be conformed to a two-dimensional surface, which provides a way to increase the number of ions while maintaining the ability to move individual ions in a two-dimensional grid. However, surface traps tend to suffer from shallow trap depths and higher motional heating rates. In this work, we report the design, fabrication, and testing of a simple gold-on-fused-silica ion trap optimized for a deep trapping potential and stable motional modes. The desirable trap characteristics include long lifetime, fully-compensated micromotion, and high secular trap frequencies that were measured using a trapped and cooled 174 Yb + ion. This trap design can be integrated with an optical cavity to enhance the ion-photon coupling.