Cold-Trapped Atoms Stay Trapped Longer

Jook T. M. Walraven

Clemens Matthiesen, Qian Yu, Jinen Guo +2 more

We demonstrate trapping of electrons in a millimeter-sized quadrupole Paul trap driven at 1.6 GHz in a room-temperature ultra-high vacuum setup. Cold electrons are introduced into the trap by ionization of atomic calcium via Rydberg states and stay confined by microwave and static electric fields for several tens of milliseconds. A fraction of these electrons remains trapped longer and shows no measurable loss for measurement times up to a second. Electronic excitation of the motion reveals secular frequencies from several tens to hundreds of MHz. Operating a similar electron Paul trap in a cryogenic environment may provide a platform for all-electric quantum computing with trapped electron spin qubits.

Daniel. SahaguÌn SaÌnchez

Tomasz Brzozowski, Maria Brzozowska, Jerzy Zachorowski +1 more

Clemens Matthiesen, Qian Yu, Jinen Guo +2 more

We demonstrate trapping of electrons in a millimeter-sized quadrupole Paul trap driven at 1.6 GHz in a room-temperature ultrahigh vacuum setup.Cold electrons are introduced into the trap by ionization of atomic calcium via Rydberg states and stay confined by microwave and static electric fields for several tens of milliseconds.A fraction of these electrons remain trapped longer and show no measurable loss for measurement times up to a second.Electronic excitation of the motion reveals secular frequencies that can be tuned over a range of several tens to hundreds of MHz.Operating a similar electron Paul trap in a cryogenic environment may provide a platform for all-electric quantum computing with trapped electron spin qubits.

Kelin Gao

Research on the development of the optical frequency standard based on trapped and cold 40 Ca + with the 4s 2 S 1/2 -3d 2 D 5/2 clock transition at 729 nm is reported. A single calcium ion was trapped and laser cooled in the Paul trap and stay in trap for more than 15 days. The linewidth of a 729 nm laser was reduced to less than 10 Hz by locking to a cavity for longer than 50 hours uninterruptedly. The overall systematic uncertainty of the clock transition has been characterized to be better than 6.5×10 −16 . The absolute frequency of the clock transition was measured at 10 −15 level using an optical frequency comb referenced to a Hydrogen maser, which was calibrated to the SI second through the global positioning system (GPS). The frequency value was 411042129776393.0(1.6) Hz after the correction of the systematic shifts.