10 research outputs found
Dark resonances as a probe for the motional state of a single ion
Single, rf-trapped ions find various applications ranging from metrology to
quantum computation. High-resolution interrogation of an extremely weak
transition under best observation conditions requires an ion almost at rest. To
avoid line-broadening effects such as the second order Doppler effect or rf
heating in the absence of laser cooling, excess micromotion has to be
eliminated as far as possible. In this work the motional state of a confined
three-level ion is probed, taking advantage of the high sensitivity of observed
dark resonances to the trapped ion's velocity. Excess micromotion is controlled
by monitoring the dark resonance contrast with varying laser beam geometry. The
influence of different parameters such as the cooling laser intensity has been
investigated experimentally and numerically
Raman cooling and heating of two trapped Ba+ ions
We study cooling of the collective vibrational motion of two 138Ba+ ions
confined in an electrodynamic trap and irradiated with laser light close to the
resonances S_1/2-P_1/2 (493 nm) and P_1/2-D_3/2 (650 nm). The motional state of
the ions is monitored by a spatially resolving photo multiplier. Depending on
detuning and intensity of the cooling lasers, macroscopically different
motional states corresponding to different ion temperatures are observed. We
also derive the ions' temperature from detailed analytical calculations of
laser cooling taking into account the Zeeman structure of the energy levels
involved. The observed motional states perfectly match the calculated
temperatures. Significant heating is observed in the vicinity of the dark
resonances of the Zeeman-split S_1/2-D_3/2 Raman transitions. Here two-photon
processes dominate the interaction between lasers and ions. Parameter regimes
of laser light are identified that imply most efficient laser cooling.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figure
Cooling atomic motion with quantum interference
We theoretically investigate the quantum dynamics of the center of mass of
trapped atoms, whose internal degrees of freedom are driven in a
-shaped configuration with the lasers tuned at two-photon resonance.
In the Lamb-Dicke regime, when the motional wave packet is well localized over
the laser wavelenght, transient coherent population trapping occurs, cancelling
transitions at the laser frequency. In this limit the motion can be efficiently
cooled to the ground state of the trapping potential. We derive an equation for
the center-of-mass motion by adiabatically eliminating the internal degrees of
freedom. This treatment provides the theoretical background of the scheme
presented in [G. Morigi {\it et al}, Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 85}, 4458 (2000)]
and implemented in [C.F. Roos {\it et al}, Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 85}, 5547
(2000)]. We discuss the physical mechanisms determining the dynamics and
identify new parameters regimes, where cooling is efficient. We discuss
implementations of the scheme to cases where the trapping potential is not
harmonic.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figure
Resonance fluorescence of a trapped three-level atom
We investigate theoretically the spectrum of resonance fluorescence of a
harmonically trapped atom, whose internal transitions are --shaped and
driven at two-photon resonance by a pair of lasers, which cool the
center--of--mass motion. For this configuration, photons are scattered only due
to the mechanical effects of the quantum interaction between light and atom. We
study the spectrum of emission in the final stage of laser--cooling, when the
atomic center-of-mass dynamics is quantum mechanical and the size of the wave
packet is much smaller than the laser wavelength (Lamb--Dicke limit). We use
the spectral decomposition of the Liouville operator of the master equation for
the atomic density matrix and apply second order perturbation theory. We find
that the spectrum of resonance fluorescence is composed by two narrow sidebands
-- the Stokes and anti-Stokes components of the scattered light -- while all
other signals are in general orders of magnitude smaller. For very low
temperatures, however, the Mollow--type inelastic component of the spectrum
becomes visible. This exhibits novel features which allow further insight into
the quantum dynamics of the system. We provide a physical model that interprets
our results and discuss how one can recover temperature and cooling rate of the
atom from the spectrum. The behaviour of the considered system is compared with
the resonance fluorescence of a trapped atom whose internal transition consists
of two-levels.Comment: 11 pages, 4 Figure
Quantum jumps induced by the center-of-mass motion of a trapped atom
We theoretically study the occurrence of quantum jumps in the resonance
fluorescence of a trapped atom. Here, the atom is laser cooled in a
configuration of level such that the occurrence of a quantum jump is associated
to a change of the vibrational center-of-mass motion by one phonon. The
statistics of the occurrence of the dark fluorescence period is studied as a
function of the physical parameters and the corresponding features in the
spectrum of resonance fluorescence are identified. We discuss the information
which can be extracted on the atomic motion from the observation of a quantum
jump in the considered setup
Resonance Fluorescence Spectrum of a Trapped Ion Undergoing Quantum Jumps
We experimentally investigate the resonance fluorescence spectrum of single
171Yb and 172Yb ions which are laser cooled to the Lamb-Dicke regime in a
radiofrequency trap. While the fluorescence scattering of 172Yb is continuous,
the 171Yb fluorescence is interrupted by quantum jumps because a nonvanishing
rate of spontaneous transitions leads to electron shelving in the metastable
hyperfine sublevel 2D3/2(F=2). The average duration of the resulting dark
periods can be varied by changing the intensity of a repumping laser field.
Optical heterodyne detection is employed to analyze the fluorescence spectrum
near the Rayleigh elastic scattering peak. It is found that the stochastic
modulation of the fluorescence emission by quantum jumps gives rise to a
Lorentzian component in the fluorescence spectrum, and that the linewidth of
this component varies according to the average duration of the dark
fluorescence periods. The experimental observations are in quantitative
agreement with theoretical predictions.Comment: 14 pages including 4 figures, pdf file, fig.1 replace
The spectrum of single-atom resonance fluorescence
The emission spectrum of the bichromatically excited resonance fluorescence of a single atomic
particle, i.e. of a permanently trapped and cooled ion has been recorded. It
shows up to five peaks, two of them partially resolved, in agreement with fluorescence spectra of
three-level atoms calculated from sets of parameters separately measured from recorded excitation
spectra of the integrated fluorescence
An atom and a photon
10.1134/S1054660X0707016XLaser Physics1771007-101