A new Caesium quantum gas microscope with precise magnetic field control

Richard Turner, Matthew Naides, Ruby A. Lai +2 more

Asaf Paris-Mandoki

Ultracold mixture experiments hold the promise of providing new insights into many-body quantum systems as well as ultracold chemistry and few-body phenomena. The work presented in this thesis dealt with the construction of a new apparatus for the production and study of ultracold gases of fermionic lithium-6 and bosonic caesium-133. These isotopes offer a wide tunability in their interaction strength, both in inter-species and intra-species collisions, through magnetic Feshbach resonances. Additionally, the widely different resonance frequencies of lithium and caesium enables independent control of each of the species. With this apparatus, Bose-Einstein condensates (BEC) containing 10^4 lithium Feshbach molecules are routinely produced. The cooling system for caesium has been developed in parallel and important steps towards producing ultracold caesium gases have been made. An optical dipole trap has been loaded with 2x10^6 caesium atoms and evaporative cooling towards quantum degeneracy can now be pursued. Laser, vacuum, magnetic and control systems have been developed for the implementation of this experiment. Light produced with this laser system was used to laser cool atoms, create conservative dipole traps as well as to provide means of imaging atomic clouds. Additionally, a system to produce strong magnetic fields of up to 1400 G has been established in order to exploit the wide tunability in the atomic interactions. Software that was developed for the computerised control system facilitated the coordination of all the components involved in the experimental sequence. Measurements and calculations that showcase the functionality of relevant parts of the setup are presented in this thesis. In this experiment, lithium and caesium atoms are obtained from a novel type of Zeeman slower and are loaded into a magneto-optical trap (MOT). The system is capable of doing this independently for each of the atomic species as well as sequentially. After the MOT has been loaded with atoms, they are transferred into a conservative far-off-resonance optical dipole trap. By adjusting the interactions between atoms and lowering the depth of the dipole trap, efficient evaporative cooling of lithium was carried out from which a molecular BEC was obtained. Time-of-flight measurements were used to characterise the condensate and study its expansion dynamics.

A. Müllers, Stefan Böttner, Daniel Kolbe +18 more

Laser-controlled charge exchange is a promising method for producing cold antihydrogen. Caesium atoms in Rydberg states collide with positrons and create positronium. These positronium atoms then interact with antiprotons, forming antihydrogen. Laser excitation of the caesium atoms is essential to increase the cross section of the charge-exchange collisions. This method was demonstrated in 2004 by the ATRAP collaboration by using an available copper vapour laser. For a second generation of charge-exchange experiments we have designed a new semiconductor laser system that features several improvements compared to the copper vapour laser. We describe this new laser system and show the results from the excitation of caesium atoms to Rydberg states within the strong magnetic fields in the ATRAP apparatus.

Amy Peng, Waseem Bakr, Jonathon I. Gillen +2 more

Simon Hollerith, Jun Rui, Antonio Rubio-Abadal +5 more

Precise control and study of molecules is challenging due to the variety of internal degrees of freedom and local coordinates that are typically not controlled in an experiment.Employing quantum gas microscopy to position and resolve the atoms in Rydberg macrodimer states solves most of these challenges and enables unique access to the molecular frame.Here, we demonstrate this approach and present photoassociation studies in which the molecular orientation relative to an applied magnetic field, the polarization of the excitation light, and the initial atomic state are fully controlled.The observed dependencies allow for an electronic structure tomography of the molecular state.We additionally observe an orientation-dependent Zeeman shift, and we reveal a significant influence on it caused by the hyperfine interaction of the macrodimer state.Finally, we demonstrate control over the electrostatic binding potential by engineering a gap between two crossing pair potentials.Our results establish macrodimers as the most sensitive tool to benchmark Rydberg interaction potentials, and they open new perspectives for improving Rydberg dressing schemes.

Jonathon I. Gillen, Waseem Bakr, Amy Peng +2 more