We demonstrate a way to circumvent the interruption of evaporative cooling observed at high bias field for $^{87}$Rb atoms trapped in the (F=2, m=+2) ground state. Our scheme uses a 3-frequencies-RF-knife achieved by mixing two RF frequencies. This compensates part of the non linearity of the Zeeman effect, allowing us to achieve BEC where standard 1-frequency-RF-knife evaporation method did not work. We are able to get efficient evaporative cooling, provided that the residual detuning between the transition and the RF frequencies in our scheme is smaller than the power broadening of the RF transitions at the end of the evaporation ramp.
We report the results of in-situ characterization of $ ^{87}$Rb atom cloud in a quadrupole Ioffe configuration (QUIC) magnetic trap after radio frequency (RF) evaporative cooling of the trapped atom cloud. The in-situ absorption images of the atom cloud have shown clear bimodal optical density (OD) profiles which indicate the Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) phase transition in the trapped gas. Also, we report the measured variation in the sizes of the condensate and thermal clouds with the final frequency in the frequency scan of the RF-field applied for evaporative cooling. The results are c…
To achieve Bose-Einstein condensation, one may implement evaporative cooling by dynamically regulating the power of laser beams forming the optical dipole trap. We propose and experimentally demonstrate a protocol of Bayesian optimization of Bose-Einstein condensation via the evaporative cooling model. Applying this protocol, pure Bose-Einstein condensate of 87Rb with 2.4X10e4 atoms can be produced via evaporative cooling from the initial stage when the number of atoms is 6.0X10e5 at a temperature of 12μK. In comparison with Bayesian optimization via blackbox experiment, our protocol only need…
In this paper, we numerically studied the effects of mechanical vibration and magnetic fields on evaporative cooling process carried in space station by direct simulation Monte Carlo method. Simulated with the vibration data of international space station, we found that the cooling process would suffer great atomic losses until the accelerations reduced tenfold at least. In addition, if we enlarge the s-wave scattering length five times by Feshbach resonance, the PSD increased to 50 compared to 3 of no magnetic fields situation after 5 seconds evaporative cooling. We also simulated the two sta…
Atomic dynamics in evaporative cooling of trapped alkali atoms in strong magnetic fields
我们研究了强磁场下塞曼位移的非线性对磁阱中射频场诱导蒸发冷却动力学的影响。我们证明了87-Rb和23-Na的F=2陷阱态的波包模拟如何冷却停止时，射频场频率低于一定的限制（85-Rb的F=2陷阱态的问题不会出现）。我们研究了强场情况下半经典模型的适用性，作为我们以前工作的扩展[Phys.Rev.A58，3983（1998）]。我们的研究结果证实了在最近的$^{87}$ Rb实验中观察到的许多方面[Phys. Rev. A 60，R1759（1999）]。
The study of cold and controlled molecular ions is pivotal for fundamental research in modern physics and chemistry. Investigations into cooling molecular anions, in particular, have proven to be of key consequence for the production of cold antihydrogen, the creation, and study of anionic Coulomb crystals as well as in atmospheric research and astrochemistry. The commonly used anion cooling technique via collisions with a buffer gas is limited by the temperature of the used cryogenic cooling medium. Here, we demonstrate forced evaporative cooling of anions via a laser beam with photon energie…
In recent years, cold atoms could prove their scientific impact not only on ground but in microgravity environments such as the drop tower in Bremen, sounding rockets and parabolic flights. We investigate the preparation of cold atoms in an optical dipole trap, with an emphasis on evaporative cooling under microgravity. Up to $ 1\times10^{6} $ rubidium-87 atoms were optically trapped from a temporarily dark magneto optical trap during free fall in the droptower in Bremen. The efficiency of evaporation is determined to be equal with and without the effect of gravity. This is confirmed using num…
Ultracold polar molecules possess long-range, anisotropic, and tunable dipolar interactions, providing the opportunities to probe quantum phenomena inaccessible with existing cold gas platforms. However, experimental progress has been hindered by the dominance of two-body loss over elastic interactions, which prevents efficient evaporative cooling. Though recent work has demonstrated controlled interactions by confining molecules to a two-dimensional geometry, a general approach for tuning molecular interactions in a three-dimensional (3D), stable system has been lacking. Here, we demonstrate …
The fluctuations in thermodynamic and transport properties in many-body systems gain importance as the number of constituent particles is reduced. Ultracold atomic gases provide a clean setting for the study of mesoscopic systems; however, the detection of temporal fluctuations is hindered by the typically destructive detection, precluding repeated precise measurements on the same sample. Here, we overcome this hindrance by utilizing the enhanced light--matter coupling in an optical cavity to perform a minimally invasive continuous measurement and track the time evolution of the atom number in…
We demonstrate direct laser cooling of a gas of rubidium 87 atoms to quantum degeneracy. The method does not involve evaporative cooling, is fast, and induces little atom loss. The atoms are trapped in a two-dimensional optical lattice that enables cycles of cloud compression to increase the density, followed by degenerate Raman sideband cooling to decrease the temperature. Light-induced loss at high atomic density is substantially reduced by using far red detuned optical pumping light. Starting with 2000 atoms, we prepare 1400 atoms in 300 ms at quantum degeneracy, as confirmed by the appeara…
Collisions between cold molecules are essential for studying fundamental aspects of quantum chemistry, and may enable formation of quantum degenerate molecular matter by evaporative cooling. However, collisions between trapped, naturally occurring molecules have so far eluded direct observation due to the low collision rates of dilute samples. We report the first directly observed collisions between cold, trapped molecules, achieved without the need of laser cooling. We magnetically capture molecular oxygen in a 0.8K x kB deep superconducting trap, and set bounds on the ratio between the elast…
We demonstrate a simple scheme to reach Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) of metastable triplet helium atoms using a single beam optical dipole trap with moderate power of less than 3 W. Our scheme is based on RF-induced evaporative cooling in a quadrupole magnetic trap and transfer to a single beam optical dipole trap that is located below the magnetic trap center. We transfer 1x10^6 atoms into the optical dipole trap, with an initial temperature of 14 μK, and observe efficient forced evaporative cooling both in a hybrid trap, in which the quadrupole magnetic trap operates just below the levit…
The preparation of low-entropy starting conditions is a key requirement for many experiments involving neutral atoms. Here, we propose a method to autonomously assemble arbitrary spatial configurations of atoms within arrays of optical tweezers or lattice sites, enabled by a combination of tunneling and ground-state laser cooling. In contrast to previous methods, our protocol does not rely on either imaging or evaporative cooling. This circumvents limitations associated with imaging fidelity and loss, especially in systems with small spatial scales, while providing a substantial improvement in…
We report on the implementation of degenerate Raman sideband cooling of $^{40}$K atoms. The scheme incorporates a 3D optical lattice, which confines the atoms and drives the Raman transitions. The optical cooling cycle is closed by two optical pumping beams. The wavelength of the laser beams forming the lattice is close to the D$_2$ atomic transition, while the optical pumping is operated near the D$_1$ transition. With this cooling method, we achieve temperature of $\sim$$1μ$K of a cloud with $\sim$$10^7$ atoms. This corresponds to a phase space density of $\ge$$10^{-3}$. Moreover, the fermio…
We present a realization of a magneto-optical trap of mercury atoms on the intercombination line. We report on trapping of all stable mercury isotopes. We characterize the effect of laser detuning, laser intensity, and gradient field on the trapping performance of our system. The atom number for the most abundant isotope Hg-202 is 50 million atoms. Moreover, we study the difference in cooling processes for bosonic and fermionic isotopes. We observe agreement with the Doppler cooling theory for the bosonic species and show sub-Doppler cooling for the fermionic species. We reach a phase space de…
We report on simultaneous sub-Doppler laser cooling of fermionic $^6$Li and $^{40}$K using the D$_1$ optical transitions. We compare experimental results to a numerical simulation of the cooling process applying a semi-classical Monte Carlo wavefunction method. The simulation takes into account the three dimensional optical molasses setup and the dipole interaction between atoms and the bichromatic light field driving the D$_1$ transitions. We discuss the physical mechanisms at play, we identify the important role of coherences between the ground state hyperfine levels and compare D$_1$ and D$…
We apply three machine learning strategies to optimize the atomic cooling processes utilized in the production of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). For the first time, we optimize both laser cooling and evaporative cooling mechanisms simultaneously. We present the results of an evolutionary optimization method (Differential Evolution), a method based on non-parametric inference (Gaussian Process regression) and a gradient-based function approximator (Artificial Neural Network). Online optimization is performed using no prior knowledge of the apparatus, and the learner succeeds in creating a BE…
