23 research outputs found
Cold trapped atoms detected with evanescent waves
We demonstrate the in situ detection of cold 87 Rb atoms near a dielectric
surface using the absorption of a weak, resonant evanescent wave. We have used
this technique in time of flight experiments determining the density of atoms
falling on the surface. A quantitative understanding of the measured curve was
obtained using a detailed calculation of the evanescent intensity distribution.
We have also used it to detect atoms trapped near the surface in a
standing-wave optical dipole potential. This trap was loaded by inelastic
bouncing on a strong, repulsive evanescent potential. We estimate that we trap
1.5 x 10 4 atoms at a density 100 times higher than the falling atoms.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure
An atom interferometer enabled by spontaneous decay
We investigate the question whether Michelson type interferometry is possible
if the role of the beam splitter is played by a spontaneous process. This
question arises from an inspection of trajectories of atoms bouncing
inelastically from an evanescent-wave (EW) mirror. Each final velocity can be
reached via two possible paths, with a {\it spontaneous} Raman transition
occurring either during the ingoing or the outgoing part of the trajectory. At
first sight, one might expect that the spontaneous character of the Raman
transfer would destroy the coherence and thus the interference. We investigated
this problem by numerically solving the Schr\"odinger equation and applying a
Monte-Carlo wave-function approach. We find interference fringes in velocity
space, even when random photon recoils are taken into account.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures, we clarified the semiclassical interpretation of
Fig.
Observation of modified radiative properties of cold atoms in vacuum near a dielectric surface
We have observed a distance-dependent absorption linewidth of cold Rb
atoms close to a dielectric-vacuum interface. This is the first observation of
modified radiative properties in vacuum near a dielectric surface. A cloud of
cold atoms was created using a magneto-optical trap (MOT) and optical molasses
cooling. Evanescent waves (EW) were used to observe the behavior of the atoms
near the surface. We observed an increase of the absorption linewidth with up
to 25% with respect to the free-space value. Approximately half the broadening
can be explained by cavity-quantum electrodynamics (CQED) as an increase of the
natural linewidth and inhomogeneous broadening. The remainder we attribute to
local Stark shifts near the surface. By varying the characteristic EW length we
have observed a distance dependence characteristic for CQED.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figures, some minor revision