Creating, detecting and locating ultracold molecules in a surface trap

Ultracold molecules have been produced by photoassociation of Cs atoms trapped in a mirror magneto-optical trap. The molecules were detected by resonantly enhanced multi-photon ionization followed by time-of-flight mass spectroscopy. The time-of-flight ofatomic and molecular ions was investigated in the presence of a dc bias voltageapplied to the conducting mirror. This technique provides a new tool for determining the distance between the cold molecules and the mirror surface. This revised version was published online in August 2005 with a corrected cover date.     

Sympathetic cooling rate of gas-phase ions in a radio-frequency-quadrupole ion trap

We theoretically investigated the mass dependence of the sympathetic cooling rate of gas-phase ions trapped in a linear radio-frequency-quadrupole ion trap. Using an a priori molecular dynamical calculation, tracing numerically with Newtonian equations of motion, we found that ions with a mass greater than 0.54±0.04 times that of the laser-cooled ions are sympathetically cooled; otherwise, they are heated. To understand the mass dependence obtained using the molecular-dynamical calculation, we made a heat-exchange model of sympathetic cooling, which shows that the factor of 0.54±0.04 is a consequence of absence of micro-motion along the axis of the linear ion trap. Received: 10 December 2001 / Revised version: 28 January 2002 / Published online: 14 March 2002     

Molecular flow and wall collision age distributions

The use of storage cells has become a standard technique for internal gas targets in conjunction with high energy storage rings. In case of spin-polarized hydrogen and deuterium gas targets the interaction of the injected atoms with the walls of the storage cell can lead to depolarization and recombination. Thus the number of wall collisions of the atoms in the target gas is important for modeling the processes of spin relaxation and recombination. It is shown in this article that the diffusion process of rarefied gases in long tubes or storage cells can be described with the help of the one-dimensional diffusion equation. Mathematical methods are presented that allow one to calculate collision age distributions (CAD) and their moments analytically. These methods provide a better understanding of the different aspects of diffusion than Monte Carlo calculations. Additionally it is shown that measurements of the atomic density or polarization of a gas sample taken from the center of the tube allow one to determine the possible range of the corresponding density weighted average values along the tube. The calculations are applied to the storage cell geometry of the HERMES internal polarized hydrogen and deuterium gas target. Received 9 July 2001 and Received in final form 18 September 2001     

Performance of a prototype microwave frequency standard based on laser-detected,trapped171Yb+ ions

A microwave frequency standard based on buffer gas-cooled¹⁷¹Yb⁺ ions confined in a linear Paul trap has been demonstrated in prototype form. The standard exhibits a fractional frequency instability characterised by an Allan deviation of (_y() = 2.9 × 10^–13–1/2 for < 2 × 10⁴ s. Factors affecting the stability of the standard have been systematically investigated.     

Origin and manifestation of the anharmonic potential felt by an ion-cloud in an actual Paul trap

The anharmonic potential felt by a single-species ions confined in a rf quadrupole trap which results from a non-ideal trap configuration and the charge distribution of the ion cloud is studied. The rf resonance-absorption spectra are explained by a Duffing oscillator and a representation of the line-shape parameter is derived. For > 0.77, the electric signals will exhibit hysteresis. The relation with the anharmonic potential is discussed.     

Line shape analysis of two-colour photoassociation spectra on the example of the Cs ground state

Two-photon photoassociation spectra in a Λ-type excitation scheme are analysed under the systematically varied experimental conditions of frequency detunings and laser intensities. Line shape fits are presented as well as the investigation of intensity and detuning dependent line shifts. From both we determine the attained spectroscopic precision, that is corrected for a systematic line shift due to the thermal distribution of atoms in the trap. An energy correction for this effect is given. Information about the feasibility of generating translationally cold molecules in a well defined rotational and vibrational level by the photoassociation process is derived from the analysis. Received 21 May 2002 Published online 15 October 2002 RID="a" ID="a"Current address e-mail: christian.lisdat@ptb.de RID="b" ID="b"e-mail: pierre.pillet@lac.u-psud.fr     

Bright optical lattices in a longitudinal magnetic field. Experimental study of the oscillating and jumping regimes

All the bright optical lattices studied so far have been designed to obtain a circularly polarized light at the bottom of the optical potential wells. This condition minimizes the departure rate of the atoms from the fundamental adiabatic surface and permits an oscillating regime in a large range of parameters. We present here an experimental study of cesium atoms in a three-dimensional optical lattice, where the light is linearly polarized at the bottom of the potential wells. Temperature measurements and pump-probe spectroscopy give similar results for this lattice and for the conventional lin lin lattice (which have circular polarizations at the bottom of the wells) despite the fact that one lattice operates in the jumping regime and the other in the oscillating regime. We study the behaviour of the two types of lattices in a longitudinal magnetic field, with particular emphasis on the zero field and strong field regimes. The strong field situation is very simple because the eigenstates are then almost pure Zeeman substates and the adiabatic and diabatic potential surfaces are identical. The comparison between the zero-field and the high-field situations shows that the diabatic potentials are more appropriate to account for experimental observations in the novel lattice. Received: 9 October 1997 / Accepted: 6 November 1997     

Evidence of radial-axial motion couplings in an rf stored ion cloud

Received: 21 February 1997/Revised version: 13 May 1997     

Laser cooling of a single Ca+ ion: Observation of quantum jumps

This paper describes trapping and laser cooling of a Ca⁺ ion in an rf quadrupole ion trap. A single Ca⁺ ion is laser cooled to below 130 mK and quantum jumps are observed by exciting the ion into the metastable D _5/2 state via the P _3/2 state. The lifetime of the metastable D _5/2 state is estimated from the distribution of the dark periods of the quantum-jump signal. Collision-induced jumps between the metastable D _3/2 state and the D _5/2 state in a background gas are also directly observed.     

Coherent coupling of a single <Superscript>40</Superscript>Ca<Superscript>+</Superscript> ion to a high-finesse optical cavity

We demonstrate coherent coupling of the quadrupole S_1/2D_5/2 optical transition of a single trapped ⁴⁰Ca⁺ ion to the standing wave field of a high-finesse cavity. The dependence of the coupling on temporal dynamics and spatial variations of the intracavity field is investigated in detail. By precisely controlling the position of the ion in the cavity standing wave field and by selectively exciting vibrational state-changing transitions the ion’s quantized vibration in the trap is deterministically coupled to the cavity mode. We confirm coherent interaction of ion and cavity field by exciting Rabi oscillations with short resonant laser pulses injected into the cavity, which is frequency-stabilized to the atomic transition. Received: 23 August 2002 / Published online: 8 January 2003 RID="*" ID="*"Corresponding author. E-mail: christoph.becher@uibk.ac.at RID="**" ID="**"Present address: Time and Frequency Division, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Boulder, CO 80305, USA