Controlled deflection of cold atomic clouds and of Bose-Einstein condensates

We present a detailed, realistic proposal and analysis of the implementation of a cold atom deflector using time-dependent far off-resonance optical guides. An analytical model and numerical simulations are used to illustrate its characteristics when applied to both non-degenerate atomic ensembles and to Bose-Einstein condensates. Using for all relevant parameters values that are achieved with present technology, we show that it is possible to deflect almost entirely an ensemble of ⁸⁷Rb atoms falling in the gravity field. We discuss the limits of this proposal, and illustrate its robustness against non-adiabatic transitions.     

Experimental study of vapor-cell magneto-optical traps for efficient trapping of radioactive atoms

We have studied magneto-optical traps (MOTs) for efficient on-line trapping of radioactive atoms. After discussing a model of the trapping process in a vapor cell and its efficiency, we present the results of detailed experimental studies on Rb MOTs. Three spherical cells of different sizes were used. These cells can be easily replaced, while keeping the rest of the apparatus unchanged: atomic sources, vacuum conditions, magnetic field gradients, sizes and power of the laser beams, detection system. By direct comparison, we find that the trapping efficiency only weakly depends on the MOT cell size. It is also found that the trapping efficiency of the MOT with the smallest cell, whose diameter is equal to the diameter of the trapping beams, is about 40% smaller than the efficiency of larger cells. Furthermore, we also demonstrate the importance of two factors: a long coated tube at the entrance of the MOT cell, used instead of a diaphragm; and the passivation with an alkali vapor of the coating on the cell walls, in order to minimize the losses of trappable atoms. These results guided us in the construction of an efficient large-diameter cell, which has been successfully employed for on-line trapping of Fr isotopes at INFN’s national laboratories in Legnaro, Italy.     

Atom interferometers manipulated through the toroidal trap realized by the interference patterns of Laguerre-Gaussian beams

In this paper, we proposed new constructions of atom interferometers manipulated through the toroidal trap formed by the interference patterns of two co-propagation Laguerre-Gaussian (LG) beams. The coherent splitting and merging of the atomic ensemble, which is essential for the atom interferometer, is realized by the interference pattern of two LG beams. Along the beam propagation direction, a single-well trap is evolved into a double-well trap and then recombined back into a single-well trap, which can be used to form an atom interferometer.     

Towards a monolithic optical cavity for atom detection and manipulation

We study a Fabry-Perot cavity formed from a ridge waveguide on a AlGaAs substrate. We experimentally determined the propagation losses in the waveguide at 780 nm, the wavelength of Rb atoms. We have also made a numerical and analytical estimate of the losses induced by the presence of the gap which would allow the interaction of cold atoms with the cavity field. We found that the intrinsic finesse of the gapped cavity can be on the order of F∼30, which, when one takes into account the losses due to mirror transmission, corresponds to a cooperativity parameter for our system C∼1.     

Electrons in a cryogenic planar Penning trap and experimental challenges for quantum processing

We report on trapping of clouds of electrons in a cryogenic planar Penning trap at T ≤100 mK. We describe the experimental conditions to load, cool and detect electrons. Perspectives for the trapping of a single electron and for quantum information processing are given.     

Impedance measurement technique for quantum systems

The impedance measurement technique consists in that the phase-dependent (parametric) inductance of the system is probed by the classical tank circuit via measuring the voltage. The notion of the parametric inductance for the impedance measurement technique is revisited for the case when a quantum system is probed. Measurement of the quantum state of the system of superconducting circuits (qubits) is studied theoretically. It is shown that the result of the measurement is defined by the partial energy levels population in the qubits and by its derivative.     

Light-pulse atom interferometry in microgravity

We describe the operation of a light pulse interferometer using cold ⁸⁷Rb atoms in reduced gravity. Using a series of two Raman transitions induced by light pulses, we have obtained Ramsey fringes in the low gravity environment achieved during parabolic flights. With our compact apparatus, we have operated in a regime which is not accessible on ground. In the much lower gravity environment and lower vibration level of a satellite, our cold atom interferometer could measure accelerations with a sensitivity orders of magnitude better than the best ground based accelerometers and close to proven spaced-based ones.     

Magnetically trapped atoms for compact atomic clocks

We investigate the hyperfine transition of magnetically trapped non-condensed atoms. The two principal frequency shifts, the second order Zeeman effect and the mean field interaction are considered. Analytic models of the mean frequency and its trap induced spread are developed. Comparisons with existing experiments evaluate the role of the atoms’ oscillatory motion. The analytic model proves to be equivalent to existing Monte Carlo simulations. The formulae provide a simple tool for optimising the design of a new experiment. Applied to the two-photon transition |F=1,m _F =−1〉→|F=2,m _F =1〉 in ⁸⁷Rb and the conditions of a typical atom chip experiment, a line spread as small as 11 mHz is predicted giving a quality factor of 10¹². The system is promising for application in precision instruments such as compact atomic clocks.     

Magnetic interactions of cold atoms with anisotropic conductors

We analyze atom-surface magnetic interactions on atom chips where the magnetic trapping potentials are produced by current carrying wires made of electrically anisotropic materials. We discuss a theory for time dependent fluctuations of the magnetic potential, arising from thermal noise originating from the surface. It is shown that using materials with a large electrical anisotropy results in a considerable reduction of heating and decoherence rates of ultra-cold atoms trapped near the surface, of up to several orders of magnitude. The trap loss rate due to spin flips is expected to be significantly reduced upon cooling the surface to low temperatures. In addition, the electrical anisotropy significantly suppresses the amplitude of static spatial potential corrugations due to current scattering within imperfect wires. Also the shape of the corrugation pattern depends on the electrical anisotropy: the preferred angle of the scattered current wave fronts can be varied over a wide range. Materials, fabrication, and experimental issues are discussed, and specific candidate materials are suggested.     

Time domain quantification of the performance of a nonlinear dynamic device in the presence of a noise floor

We consider the performance of a nonlinear dynamic device, operated as a threshold detector, in the time domain. The device is characterized by a figure-of-merit that involves the mean residence times in its two stable steady states, as well as the dispersion in this quantity stemming from a noise floor. As a particular example, we consider a coupled (overdamped) oscillator system, the underpinnings of a coupled core magnetometer (CCM). We provide a detailed discussion of how the device is used, in practice, to detect a weak dc target magnetic field, and explain the importance of characteristic time-scales in the problem specifically the device time-constant, the noise correlation time and the observation time (to obtain an averaged reading in the presence of noise). A device “Resolution” is introduced as a performance measure and is, analytically, computed under specific (but realistic for practical applications) conditions. This measure is shown to be independent of the target signal; in fact it depends only on the noise and device parameters, in the weak signal limit (that is of interest in most applications). The resolution is seen to be analogous to the inverse of a response signal-to-noise ratio.     

Spherically symmetric non-commutative space: d=4

In order to find a non-commutative analog of Schwarzschild or Schwarzschild–de Sitter black hole we investigate spherically symmetric spaces generated by four non-commutative coordinates in the frame formalism. We present two solutions which, however, do not possess the prescribed commutative limit. Our analysis indicates that the appropriate non-commutative space might be found as a subspace of a higher-dimensional space.     

A compact dual atom interferometer gyroscope based on laser-cooled rubidium

We present a compact and transportable inertial sensor for precision sensing of rotations and accelerations. The sensor consists of a dual atom interferometer operated with laser-cooled ⁸⁷Rb. Raman processes are employed to coherently manipulate the matter waves. We describe and characterize the experimental apparatus. A method for passing from a compact geometry to an extended interferometer with three independent atom-light interaction zones is proposed and investigated. The extended geometry will enhance the sensitivity by more than two orders of magnitude which is necessary to achieve sensitivities better than 10^-8rad/s/.     

Complete and incomplete fusion in12C+93Nb and16O+89Y reactions

Excitation functions for the evaporation residues for the reactions¹²C+⁹³Nb and¹⁶O+⁸⁹Y in the projectile energy range of 4 to 6.5 MeV/amu have been measured using off-line gamma spectrometry. The excitation functions for neutron(xn), proton(pxn) and one alpha(xn) emission channels are practically similar for both the reactions. However the products formed by two alpha(2xn) emission show much higher cross sections in the¹²C+⁹³Nb than the¹⁶O+⁸⁹Y system. This has been explained in terms of the incomplete fusion process involving transfer of an alpha particle from the projectile to the target in the former case.Authors thank Shri D.C. Ephraim for making the rolled metal foils and the operation crew of PELLETRON facility for their help in carrying out the irradiations. Authors are grateful to Dr. P.R. Natarajan, Head Radiochemistry Division for his keen interest in this work.     

How the effective boson-boson interaction works in Bose-Fermi mixtures in periodic geometries

We study mixtures of spinless bosons and not spin-polarized fermions loaded in two dimensional optical lattices. We approach the problem of the ground state stability within the framework of the linear response theory; by the mean of an iterative procedure, we are able to obtain a relation for the dependence of boson-boson effective interaction on the absolute temperature of the sample. Proceeding from such a formula, we write down analytical expressions for supersolid (SS) and phase separation (PS) transition temperatures, and plot the phase diagrams.     

Mutual inductance effects in rf driven planar Josephson junctions arrays

In this paper we investigate the behavior of moderate size two-dimensional classical arrays of Josephson junctions in presence of an external oscillating field. We have included in the model the effects due to mutual inductance terms, and we have employed an explicit set of differential equations. We have found that the discretization parameter - i.e. the coupling term due to the inductance of the loops - is the most important parameter to determine the height of the Shapiro steps for a given amplitude and frequency of the rf-bias. The amplitude of the Shapiro steps in the case of zero frustration as a function of the coupling term shows a remarkable minimum for intermediate values when we retain all terms of the full model with mutual inductances, while the limits for very large and very small values of they are the same of the single Josephson junction. For the case of frustration 1/2 the Shapiro step becomes smaller in the rigid limit (i.e., small ) as expected for the XY model, and tends to the limit value of the single junctions for the decoupled case (i.e., large ). Received 9 November 1998 and Received in final form 6 April 1999     

Technical remarks and comments on the UV/IR-mixing problem of a noncommutative scalar quantum field theory

The possibility of a resummation procedure in order to cure the UV/IR-mixing problem of noncommutative field theories is discussed. The method is presented for a scalar φ⁴ theory on Euclidean space. Finally, we sketch the idea of resummation forU(1)-gauge theories.     

Production of fast evaporation residues by the reaction20Ne+208Pb at projectile energies of 8.6, 11.4 and 14.9 A.MeV

Velocity distributions and production cross sections of evaporation residues have been measured in the reaction²⁰Ne+²⁰⁸Pb at projectile energies of 8.6, 11.4, 14.9 A.MeV. Essential deviations from statistical model of deexcitation have been observed. Monte Carlo simulations involving emission of non-equilibrium particles have been used in order to reproduce experimental velocity, charge and mass distributions of evaporation residues and to estimate indirectly multiplicities of pre-equilibrium particles. Communicated by V. Metag     

Giant monopole resonances in the statistical model

The strength functions fore ⁺ e ^– pair decay of the isoscalar and isovector giant monopole resonances in highly excited nuclei are derived and used in a statistical model calculation of thee ⁺ e ^– pair energy spectrum from compound nuclear decay in¹¹⁰Sn following a fusion evaporation reaction. This result is then compared to thee ⁺ e ^– spectrum derived from internal pair decay of the giant dipole and giant quadrupole resonances. The computation shows that the pair decay from the excited-state GDR dominates the pair spectrum over the region of all giant resonances, exceedingL=0 transitions by at least a factor of ten. We also compute the angular correlations betweene ⁺ ande ^– for theL=0, L=1 andL=2 transitions and estimate their power to discriminate between the various multipolarities.Dedicated to Prof. Dr. P. Kienle on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

Coulomb corrections to Delbrück scattering

The emission of high-energy-rays in the deexcitation of hot⁴⁰Ca and³⁹K nuclei formed in heavy-ion fusion reactions at excitation energyE _x 90 MeV has been studied. The high energy-rays were measured in coincidence with evaporation residues or light charged particles. The spectrum from the self-conjugated compound nucleus⁴⁰Ca shows an appreciable yield suppression in the Giant Dipole Resonance (GDR) energy region with respect to the³⁹K, due to isospin selection rules in the dipole-decay. The spectral line shapes of the spectra are well reproduced by using a statistical code which treats explicitly the isospin quantum number in evaluating level densities and transmission coefficients. The GDR parameters determined from the present coincidence measurements are in good agreement with the systematic in theA 40 mass region at lower bombarding energy based on the analysis of inclusive spectra.We thank M. Caldogno for technical support in the development of evaporation residues detectors. We acknowledge the participation of M. Anghinolfi, P. Corvisiero, M. Taiuti and A. Zucchiatti in the early stages of this work. Thanks are due to M. Kicinska-Habior for providing the isospin-dependent code. Discussions with B. Fornal are also gratefully acknowledged.     

Study of superdeformed bands in nuclei withA ∼ 150 by heavy-ion-γ coincidences

Superdeformed (SD) bands in¹⁵²Dy,¹⁵¹Dy and¹⁵¹Tb have been populated via the 5n, 6n and 5np evaporation channels, respectively, with the³³S+¹²⁴Sn reaction at 160 and 170 MeV bombarding energies. Population intensities are in good agreement with existing data for SD bands in^{151, 152}Dy and SD yrast band in¹⁵¹Tb. The excited twin SD band in¹⁵¹Tb with the same-transitions as the band in¹⁵²Dy is populated about 5 times more strongly than by the 6n evaporation channel. This might be explained in terms of competition between proton and emission out of an intermediate, excited superdeformed configuration of¹⁵²Dy.Dedicated to Prof. Dr. P. Kienle on the occasion of his 60th birthday