Design and construction of multi-dimensional optical lattices for 87 Rb Bose-Einstein condensates

In recent years, ultracold atomic gases have been used as tools to study strongly-correlated systems reminiscent of interesting systems from solid-state physics. At temperatures just above absolute zero, particles with integer quantum spin ( bosons ) begin to congregate in the ground state of the trapping potential. As the temperature of the system falls below a critical temperature Tc (in this experiment near 200 nK) it undergoes a phase transition called Bose-Einstein condensation. A Bose-Einstein condensate is often described as a macroscopic quantum body, and due to its phase coherence (analogous to an atom laser ) can be used to simulate solid-state systems in a periodic potential called an optical lattice, which resembles that experienced by electrons in the periodic Coulomb potential of a solid-state crystal lattice. These optical lattices are formed by the interference pattern of multiple laser beams, and the associated spatially-dependent Stark shift, resulting in trapping potential for the BEC. The lattice analogs of simple atomic structures have been widely studied. In this thesis, we study the possibility of loading a BEC into multi-dimensional optical lattices. The crystallography of four-beam three-dimensional optical lattices is investigated, and an apparatus is constructed to produce two- to four-beam lattice geometries. We study the structure of the lattice through the technique of Kapitza-Dirac scattering