We present a new electro-optic modulation technique that enables a single laser diode to realize a cold-atom source and a quantum inertial sensor based on matter-wave interferometry. Using carrier-suppressed dual single-sideband modulation, an IQ modulator generates two optical sidebands from separate radio-frequency (rf) signals. These sidebands are controlled independently in frequency, phase, and power using standard rf components. Our laser source exhibits improved rejection of parasitic sidebands compared to those based on phase modulators, which generate large systematic shifts in atom interferometers. We measure the influence of residual laser lines on an atom-interferometric gravimeter and show agreement with a theoretical model. We estimate a reduction of the systematic shift by two orders of magnitude compared to previous architectures, and reach a long-term sensitivity of 15 ng on the gravitational acceleration with an interrogation time of only T = 20 ms. Finally, we characterize the performance of our integrated laser system, and show that it is suitable for mobile sensing applications including gravity surveys and inertial navigation.
Low-phase-noise and pure-spectrum Raman light is vital for high-precision atom interferometry by two-photon Raman transition. A preferred and prevalent solution for Raman light generation is electro-optic phase modulation. However, phase modulation inherently brings in double sidebands, resulting in residual sideband effects of multiple laser pairs beside Raman light in atom interferometry. Based on a well-designed rectangular fiber Bragg grating and an electro-optic modulator, optical single-sideband modulation has been realized at 1560 nm with a stable suppression ratio better than -25 dB de…
A frequency doubled I/Q modulator based optical single-sideband (OSSB) laser system is demonstrated for atomic physics research, specifically for atom interferometry where the presence of additional sidebands causes parasitic transitions. The performance of the OSSB technique and the spectrum after second harmonic generation are measured and analyzed. The additional sidebands are removed with better than 20 dB suppression, and the influence of parasitic transitions upon stimulated Raman transitions at varying spatial positions is shown to be removed beneath experimental noise. This technique w…
This paper reports on a detailed performance characterization of a recently developed optical single-sideband (OSSB) laser system based on an IQ modulator and second-harmonic generation for rubidium atom interferometry experiments. The measured performance is used to evaluate the noise contributions of this OSSB laser system when it is applied to drive stimulated Raman transitions in $^{87}$Rb for precision measurements of gravitational acceleration. The laser system suppresses unwanted sideband components, but additional phase shift compensation needs to be applied when performing frequency c…
In this paper, we report a new scheme to amplify a microwave signal carried on a laser light at $λ$=852nm. The amplification is done via a semiconductor tapered amplifier and this scheme is used to drive stimulated Raman transitions in an atom interferometer. Sideband generation in the amplifier, due to self-phase and amplitude modulation, is investigated and characterized. We also demonstrate that the amplifier does not induce any significant phase-noise on the beating signal. Finally, the degradation of the performances of the interferometer due to the amplification process is shown to be ne…
We demonstrate a simple method to obtain accurate optical waveforms with a GHz-level programmable modulation bandwidth and Watt-level output power for wideband optical control of free atoms and molecules. Arbitrary amplitude and phase modulations are transferred from microwave to light with a low-power fiber electro-optical modulator. The sub-milliWatt optical sideband is co-amplified with the optical carrier in a power-balanced fashion through a tapered semiconductor amplifier (TSA). By automatically keeping TSA near saturation in a quasi-continuous manner, typical noise channels associated w…
A compact and robust laser system for atom interferometry based on a frequency-doubled telecom laser is presented. Thanks to an original stabilization architecture on a saturated absorption setup, we obtain a frequency-agile laser system allowing fast tuning of the laser frequency over 1 GHz in few ms using a single laser source. The different laser frequencies used for atom interferometry are generated by changing dynamically the frequency of the laser and by creating sidebands using a phase modulator. A laser system for Rubidium 87 atom interferometry using only one laser source based on a f…
Strong optical forces with minimal spontaneous emission are desired for molecular deceleration and atom interferometry applications. We report experimental benchmarking of such a stimulated optical force driven by ultrafast laser pulses. We apply this technique to accelerate atoms, demonstrating up to an average of $19$ $\hbar k$ momentum transfers per spontaneous emission event. This represents more than an order of magnitude improvement in suppression of spontaneous emission compared to radiative scattering forces. For molecular beam slowing, this technique is capable of delivering a many-fo…
Bragg diffraction has been used in atom interferometers because it allows signal enhancement through multiphoton momentum transfer and suppression of systematics by not changing the internal state of atoms. Its multi-port nature, however, can lead to parasitic interferometers, allows for intensity-dependent phase shifts in the primary interferometers, and distorts the ellipses used for phase extraction. We study and suppress these unwanted effects. Specifically, phase extraction by ellipse fitting and the resulting systematic phase shifts are calculated by Monte Carlo simulations. Phase shifts…
Stimulated emission is the process fundamental to laser operation, thereby producing coherent photon output. Despite negatively-charged nitrogen-vacancy (NV$^-$) centres being discussed as a potential laser medium since the 1980's, there have been no definitive observations of stimulated emission from ensembles of NV$^-$ to date. Reasons for this lack of demonstration include the short excited state lifetime and the occurrence of photo-ionisation to the neutral charge state by light around the zero-phonon line. Here we show both theoretical and experimental evidence for stimulated emission fro…
We demonstrate a macroscopic magnetic guide for cold atoms with suppressed longitudinal field curvature which is highly desired for atom interferometry. The guide is based on macroscopic copper tape coils in a copropagating currents geometry, where the atoms are located between the coils few cm away from each surface. The symmetric geometry provides a much lower magnetic field curvature per fixed length that promises longer coherence time for atom interferometers. A double-tape design of each coil allows a smooth translation of guided atoms without addition of an external bias field. The guide…
Atom interferometry is an exciting tool to probe fundamental physics. It is considered especially apt to test the universality of free fall by using two different sorts of atoms. The increasing sensitivity required for this kind of experiment sets severe requirements on its environments, instrument control, and systematic effects. This can partially be mitigated by going to space as was proposed, for example, in the Spacetime Explorer and Quantum Equivalence Principle Space Test (STE-QUEST) mission. However, the requirements on the instrument are still very challenging. For example, the specif…
The extreme miniaturization of a cold-atom interferometer accelerometer requires the development of novel technologies and architectures for the interferometer subsystems. Here we describe several component technologies and a laser system architecture to enable a path to such miniaturization. We developed a custom, compact titanium vacuum package containing a microfabricated grating chip for a tetrahedral grating magneto-optical trap (GMOT) using a single cooling beam. In addition, we designed a multi-channel photonic-integrated-circuit-compatible laser system implemented with a single seed la…
Gravity is the weakest fundamental interaction and the only one that has not been measured at the particle level. Traditional experimental methods, from astronomical observations to torsion balances, use macroscopic masses to both source and probe gravitational fields. Matter wave interferometers have used neutrons, atoms and molecular clusters as microscopic test particles, but initially probed the field sourced by the entire earth. Later, the gravitational field arising from hundreds of kilograms of artificial source masses was measured with atom interferometry. Miniaturizing the source mass…
