The interaction of Na atoms with a surface was probed by inserting a nanofabricated material grating into one arm of an atom interferometer (IFM). This technique permits a direct measurement of the change in phase and coherence of matter waves as they pass within 25 nm of the grating bar surface. The practical concerns and challenges of making such a measurement are discussed here. Interference of spurious diffraction orders, IFM path overlap, and the partial obscuration of IFM beams are all important aspects of this experiment. The systematic effects that contribute to the measured phase shift and contrast are discussed.
The operation of a BEC based atom interferometer, where the atoms are held in a weakly-confining magnetic trap and manipulated with counter-propagating laser beams, is analyzed. A simple analytic model is developed to describe the dynamics of the interferometer. It is used to find the regions of parameter space with high and low contrast of the interference fringes for both single and double reflection interferometers. We demonstrate that for a double reflection interferometer the coherence time can be increased by shifting the recombination time. The theory is compared with recent experimenta…
We describe an atom interferometer to study the coherence of atoms reflected from an evanescent wave mirror. The interferometer is sensitive to the loss of phase coherence induced by the defects in the mirror. The results are consistent with and complementary to recent measurements of specular reflection.
This is presented the justification of the expression for the atom interferometer phase in the presence of proof mass used in arXiv:1407.7287. Quantum corrections to that expression are also derived. The corrections allow one to calculate numerically atom interferometer phase with accuracy 1ppm or better.
The coherence time, and thus sensitivity, of trapped atom interferometers that use non-degenerate gasses are limited by the collisions between the atoms. An analytic model that describes the effects of collisions between atoms in an interferometer is developed. It is then applied to an interferometer using a harmonically trapped non-degenerate atomic gas that is manipulated with a single set of standing wave laser pulses. The model is used to find the optimal operating conditions of the interferometer and direct Monte-Carlo simulation of the interferometer is used to verify the analytic model.
We report on a trapped atom interferometer based on Bragg diffraction and Bloch oscillations with alkaline-earth-metal atoms. We use a Ramsey-Bordé Bragg interferometer with $^{88}$Sr atoms combined with Bloch oscillations to extend the interferometer time. Thanks to a long coherence time for Bloch oscillations of $^{88}$Sr atoms, we observed interference up to 1 s evolution time in the lattice. A detailed study of decoherence sources during the Bloch phase is also presented. While still limited in sensitivity by lattice lifetime and beam inhomogeneity this result opens the way to high contras…
We evaluate the realization of a novel geometry of a guided atom interferometer based on a high temperature superconducting microstructure. The interferometer type structure is obtained with a guiding potential realized by two current carrying superconducting wires in combination with a closed superconducting loop sustaining a persistent current. We present the layout and realization of our superconducting atom chip. By employing simulations we discuss the critical parameters of the interferometer guide in particular near the splitting regions of the matter waves. Based on measurements of the …
We demonstrate an atom interferometer operating on the $^1S_0-{}^3P_0$ clock transition of $^{87}$Sr atoms in a "magic" optical guide, where the light shift perturbations of the guiding potential are canceled. As a proof-of-principle demonstration, a Mach-Zehnder interferometer is set horizontally to map the acceleration introduced by the focused optical guide. This magic guide interferometer on the clock transition is applicable to atomic elements where magic wavelengths can be found. Possible applications of the magic guide interferometer, including a hollow-core fiber interferometer and gra…
Tune-out wavelengths measured with an atom interferometer are sensitive to laboratory rotation rates because of the Sagnac effect, vector polarizability, and dispersion compensation. We observed shifts in measured tune-out wavelengths as large as 213 pm with a potassium atom beam interferometer, and we explore how these shifts can be used for an atom interferometer gyroscope.
High sensitivity differential atom interferometers are promising for precision measurements in science frontiers in space, including gravity field mapping for Earth science studies and gravitational wave detection. We propose a new configuration of twin atom interferometers connected by a laser ranging interferometer (LRI-AI) to provide precise information of the displacements between the two AI reference mirrors and a means to phase-lock the two independent interferometer lasers over long distances, thereby further enhancing the feasibility of long baseline differential atom interferometers. …
In atom interferometers based on two photon transitions, the delay induced by the difference of the laser beams paths makes the interferometer sensitive to the fluctuations of the frequency of the lasers. We first study, in the general case, how the laser frequency noise affects the performance of the interferometer measurement. Our calculations are compared with the measurements performed on our cold atom gravimeter based on stimulated Raman transitions. We finally extend this study to the case of cold atom gradiometers.
Decoherence due to scattering from background gas particles is observed for the first time in a Mach-Zehnder atom interferometer, and compared with decoherence due to scattering photons. A single theory is shown to describe decoherence due to scattering either atoms or photons. Predictions from this theory are tested by experiments with different species of background gas, and also by experiments with different collimation restrictions on an atom beam interferometer.
We demonstrate an atomic interferometer based on ultra-cold atoms released from an optical lattice. This technique yields a large improvement in signal to noise over a related interferometer previously demonstrated. The interferometer involves diffraction of the atoms using a pulsed optical lattice. For short pulses a simple analytical theory predicts the expected signal. We investigate the interferometer for both short pulses and longer pulses where the analytical theory break down. Longer pulses can improve the precision and signal size. For specific pulse lengths we observe a coherent signa…
We present a new scheme for measuring the differential phase in dual atom interferometers. The magnetic field is modulated in one interferometer, and the differential phase can be extracted without measuring the amplitude of the magnetic field by combining the ellipse and linear fitting methods. The gravity gradient measurements are discussed based on dual atom interferometers. Numerical simulation shows that the systematic error of the differential phase measurement is largely decreased when the duration of the magnetic field is symmetrically modulated. This combined fitting scheme has a high…
We report the experimental study of an atom-chip interferometer using ultracold rubidium 87 atoms above the Bose-Einstein condensation threshold. The observed dependence of the contrast decay time with temperature and with the degree of symmetry of the traps during the interferometer sequence is in good agreement with theoretical predictions published in [Dupont-Nivet et al., NJP 18, 113012 (2016)]. These results pave the way for precision measurements with trapped thermal atoms.
Large Momentum Transfer (LMT) beam splitters are implemented in atom interferometers to increase their sensitivity. However, LMT-interferometer requires additional light-pulses that modify the response function of the atom interferometer. In this paper, we develop an analytical model for the sensitivity function of the LMT-interferometers using sequential accelerating light pulses. We use the sensitivity function to calculate the acceleration sensitivity taking into account the pulse duration. In addition, the sensitivity to laser phase uctuations is calculated, and we show that the pulse sequ…
We report on the first atom interferometer based on Bragg diffraction in a fountain of alkaline-earth atoms, namely $^{88}$Sr. We demonstrate large momentum transfer to the atoms up to eight photon recoils and the use of the interferometer as a gravimeter with a sensitivity $δg/g=4\times 10^{-8}$. Thanks to the special characteristics of strontium atoms for precision measurements, this result opens a new way for experiments in fundamental and applied physics.
In this letter, we report a measurement of the Aharonov-Casher (AC) geometric phase with our lithium atom interferometer. The AC phase appears when a particle carrying a magnetic dipole propagates in a transverse electric field. The first measurement of the AC phase was done with a neutron interferometer in 1989 by A. Cimmino \textit{et al.} (Phys. Rev. Lett. \textbf{63}, 380, 1989) and all the following experiments were done with Ramsey or Ramsey-Bordé interferometers with molecules or atoms. In our experiment, we use lithium atoms pumped in a single hyperfine-Zeeman sublevel and we measure t…
Atom interferometry relies on the separation and recombination of atom wavepackets. When the two paths overlap perfectly at the end of the interferometer, the phase is insensitive to the atomic velocity distribution. Here, we show that, when the separation and recombination is performed using a Raman transition there is a displacement of the atomic wavepacket due to a phase shift during light pulses. Because of the variation of the laser intensity seen by the atoms, there is an imperfect cancellation of these displacements. The observation of a velocity-dependent phase shift on the interferome…
We propose and demonstrate a method for calibrating atomic trajectories in a large-area dual-atom-interferometer gyroscope. The atom trajectories are monitored by modulating and delaying the Raman transition, and they are precisely calibrated by controlling the laser orientation and the bias magnetic field. To improve the immunity to the gravity effect and the common phase noise, the symmetry and the overlapping of two large-area atomic interference loops are optimized by calibrating the atomic trajectories and by aligning the Raman-laser orientations. The dual-atom-interferometer gyroscope is…
We demonstrate an atom interferometer that uses a laser-cooled continuous beam of $^{87}$Rb atoms having velocities of 10--20 m/s. With spatially separated Raman beams to coherently manipulate the atomic wave packets, Mach--Zehnder interference fringes are observed at an interference distance of 2L = 19 mm. The apparatus operates within a small enclosed area of 0.07 mm$^2$ at a bandwidth of 190 Hz with a deduced sensitivity of $7.8\times10^{-5}$ rad/s/$\sqrt{Hz}$ for rotations. Using a low-velocity continuous atomic source in an atom interferometer enables high sampling rates and bandwidths wi…
A free-oscillation interferometer uses atoms confined in a harmonic trap. Bragg scattering from an off-resonant laser is used to split an atomic wave function into two separated packets. After one or more oscillations in the trap, the wave packets are recombined by a second application of the Bragg laser to close the interferometer. Anharmonicity in the trap potential can lead to a phase shift in the interferometer output. In this paper, analytical expressions for the anharmonic phase are derived at leading order for perturbations of arbitrary power in the position coordinate. The phase genera…
The role of source cloud spatial coherence in a Mach-Zehnder type atom interferometer is experimentally investigated. The visibility and contrast of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) and three thermal sources with varying spatial coherence are compared as a function of interferometer time. At short times, the fringe visibility of a BEC source approaches 100 % nearly independent of pi pulse efficiency, while thermal sources have fringe visibilities limited to the mirror efficiency. More importantly for precision measurement systems, the BEC source maintains interference at interferometer times s…
We present an observation of zero to $π$ phase flips induced by Rabi oscillation in an unbalanced Ramsey atom interferometer. The phase shift and visibility are experimentally investigated by modulating either the polarization or duration of Raman lasers, and they are well explained by a theoretical model. In an atom interferometer, the $π$-phase flips are caused not only by the sign of Rabi frequency but also by the Rabi oscillation. Considering the $π$-phase flips, we propose the composite-light-pulse sequences for realizing the large-momentum-transfer beam splitter and mirror, which have th…
We investigated the Raman pulse duration effect in a gravity gradiometer with two atom interferometers. Since the two atom clouds in the gradiometer experience different gravitational fields, it is hard to compensate the Doppler shifts of the two clouds simultaneously by chirping the frequency of a common Raman laser, which leads to an appreciable phase shift. When applied to an experiment measuring the Newtonian gravitational constant G, the effect contributes to a systematic offset as large as -49ppm in Nature 510, 518 (2014). Thus an underestimated value of G measured by atom interferometer…
We present a pair of simultaneous conjugate Ramsey-Borde atom interferometers (SCI) using large (20\hbar k)-momentum transfer (LMT) beam splitters, where \hbar k is the photon momentum. Simultaneous operation allows for common-mode rejection of vibrational noise. This allows us to surpass the enclosed space-time area of previous interferometers with a splitting of 20\hbar k by a factor of 2,500. Among applications, we demonstrate a 3.4 ppb resolution in the fine structure constant and discuss tests of fundamental laws of physics.
It is shown that using beam splitters with non-equal wave vectors results in a new recoil diagram which is qualitatively different from the well-known diagram associated with the Mach-Zehnder atom interferometer. We predict a new asymmetric Mach-Zehnder atom interferometer (AMZAI) and study it when one uses a Raman beam splitter. The main feature is that the phase of AMZAI contains a quantum part proportional to the recoil frequency. A response sensitive only to the quantum phase was found. A new technique to measure the recoil frequency and fine structure constant is proposed and studied outs…
IIn this paper we demonstrate a new scheme for Raman transitions which realize a symmetric momentum-space splitting of $4 \hbar k$, deflecting the atomic wave-packets into the same internal state. Combining the advantages of Raman and Bragg diffraction, we achieve a three pulse state labelled interferometer, intrinsically insensitive to the main systematics and applicable to all kind of atomic sources. This splitting scheme can be extended to $4N \hbar k$ momentum transfer by a multipulse sequence and is implemented on a $8 \hbar k$ interferometer. We demonstrate the area enhancement by measur…
We present a compact and transportable inertial sensor for precision sensing of rotations and accelerations. The sensor consists of a dual Mach-Zehnder-type atom interferometer operated with laser-cooled $^{87}$Rb. 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 ne…
Atom-interferometer gyroscopes have attracted much attention for their potential superior long-term stability and extremely low drift. For such high precision instrument, a self-calibration to achieve an absolute rotation measurement is highly demanded. Here we propose and demonstrate a self-calibration of the atomic gyroscope. The calibration is realized by using the detuning of laser frequency to control the atomic velocity thus to modulate the scale factor of the gyroscope. The modulation determines the order and the initial phase of the interference stripe, thus eliminates the ambiguity ca…
Thales Research and Technology France（泰雷兹研究技术法国）；Université Paris-Saclay, Institut d’Optique Graduate School, CNRS, Laboratoire Charles Fabry（巴黎萨克雷大学、高等光学学院、法国国家科学研究中心、夏尔·法布里实验室）
We experimentally and theoretically study the diffraction phase of large-momentum transfer beam splitters in atom interferometers based on Bragg diffraction. We null the diffraction phase and increase the sensitivity of the interferometer by combining Bragg diffraction with Bloch oscillations. We demonstrate agreement between experiment and theory, and a 1500-fold reduction of the diffraction phase, limited by measurement noise. In addition to reduced systematic effects, our interferometer has high contrast with up to 4.4 million radians of phase difference, and a resolution in the fine struct…
A versatile miniature de Broglie waveguide is formed by two parallel current-carrying wires in the presence of a uniform bias field. We derive a variety of analytical expressions to describe the guide and present a quantum theory to show that it offers a remarkable range of possibilities for atom manipulation on the sub-micron scale. These include controlled and coherent splitting of the wavefunction as well as cooling, trapping and guiding. In particular we discuss a novel microscopic atom interferometer with the potential to be exceedingly sensitive.
We report on an original and simple formulation of the phase shift in N-light-pulse atom interferometers. We consider atomic interferometers based on two-photon transitions (Raman transitions or Bragg pulses). Starting from the exact analytical phase shift formula obtained from the atom optics ABCD formalism, we use a power series expansion in time of the position of the atomic wave packet with respect to the initial condition. The result of this expansion leads to a formulation of the interferometer phase shift where the leading coefficient in the phase terms up to T^k dependences (k >= 0) in…
We present here an analysis of the sensitivity of a time-domain atomic interferometer to the phase noise of the lasers used to manipulate the atomic wave-packets. The sensitivity function is calculated in the case of a three pulse Mach-Zehnder interferometer, which is the configuration of the two inertial sensors we are building at BNM-SYRTE. We successfully compare this calculation to experimental measurements. The sensitivity of the interferometer is limited by the phase noise of the lasers, as well as by residual vibrations. We evaluate the performance that could be obtained with state of t…
A new approach to the theory of atoms' interaction with chirped Raman pulses is developed. When the pulses have sufficiently close effective wave lengths, which are smaller than the atomic cloud size, equations for the family of the matrix elements of the atomic density matrix in the Wigner representation are derived. The solution, involving linear (in the pulse duration) phase corrections, is obtained for the rectangular pulse. The interferometric part of the atoms' excitation is calculated.
We analyze the nature and performance of clocks formed by stabilizing an oscillator to the phase difference between two paths of an atom interferometer. The phase evolution has been modeled as being driven by the proper-time difference between the two paths, although it has an ambiguous origin in the non-relativistic limit and it requires a full quantum-field-theory treatment in the general case. We present conditions for identifying deviations from the non-relativistic limit as a way of testing the proper-time driven phase evolution model. We show that the system performance belies the premis…
We present the full evaluation of a cold atom gyroscope based on atom interferometry. We have performed extensive studies to determine the systematic errors, scale factor and sensitivity. We demonstrate that the acceleration noise can be efficiently removed from the rotation signal allowing to reach the fundamental limit of the quantum projection noise for short term measurements. The technical limits to the long term sensitivity and accuracy have been identified, clearing the way for the next generations of ultra-sensitive atom gyroscopes.
The Zhaoshan long-baseline Atom Interferometer Gravitation Antenna (ZAIGA) is a new type of underground laser-linked interferometer facility, and is currently under construction. It is in the 200-meter-on-average underground of a mountain named Zhaoshan which is about 80 km southeast to Wuhan. ZAIGA will be equipped with long-baseline atom interferometers, high-precision atom clocks, and large-scale gyros. ZAIGA facility will take an equilateral triangle configuration with two 1-km-apart atom interferometers in each arm, a 300-meter vertical tunnel with atom fountain and atom clocks mounted, a…
We investigate the effect of coherent population trapping (CPT) in an atom inter-ferometer gravimeter based on the use of stimulated Raman transitions. We find that CPT leads to significant phase shifts, of order of a few mrad, which may compromise the accuracy of inertial measurements. We show that this effect is rejected by the k-reversal technique, which consists in averaging inertial measurements performed with two opposite orientations of the Raman wavevector k, provided that internal states at the input of the interferometer are kept identical for both configurations.
We realize a Mach-Zehnder-type dual-atom-interferometer gyroscope with an interrogation arm of 40 cm length and the interference area up to 1.2 cm$^2$. The precise angular alignment of the large-scale separated Raman lasers is demonstrated by seeking the phase intersection of Ramsey-Bord$\acute{e}$ interferometers after the gravity effect is compensated and by decoupling the velocity dependent crosstalk phase shifts, and applied to build the Mach-Zehnder atom interferometer. Then a compact inertial rotation sensor is realized based on dual large-area Mach-Zehnder atom interferometers by precis…
Wavefront aberrations are identified as a major limitation in quantum sensors. They are today the main contribution in the uncertainty budget of best cold atom interferometers based on two-photon laser beam splitters, and constitute an important limit for their long-term stability, impeding these instruments from reaching their full potential. Moreover, they will also remain a major obstacle in future experiments based on large momentum beam splitters. In this article, we tackle this issue by using a deformable mirror to control actively the laser wavefronts in atom interferometry. In particul…
Cold-atom interferometers with optical splitting and recombination use off-resonant laser beams to split a cloud of Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) into two clouds that travel along different paths and are then recombined again using optical beams. After the recombination, the BEC in general populates both the cloud at rest and the moving clouds. Measuring relative number of atoms in each of these clouds yields information about the relative phase shift accumulated by the atoms in the two moving clouds during the interferometric cycle. We derive the expression for the probability of finding any…
We theoretically investigate the application of the fringe-locking method (FLM) in the dual-species quantum test of the weak equivalence principle (WEP). With the FLM, the measurement is performed invariably at the midfringe, and the extraction of the phase shift for atom interferometers is linearized. For the simultaneous interferometers, this linearization enables a good common-mode rejection of vibration noise, which is usually the main limit for high precision WEP tests of dual-species kind. We note that this method also allows for an unbiased determination of the gravity accelerations dif…
Correlating the signals from simultaneous atom interferometers has enabled some of the most precise determinations of fundamental constants. Here, we show that multiple interferometers with strategically chosen initial conditions ("offset simultaneous conjugate interferometers" or OSCIs) can provide multi-channel readouts that amplify or suppress specific effects. This allows us to measure the photon recoil, and thus the fine structure constant, while being insensitive to gravity gradients, general acceleration gradients, and unwanted diffraction phases - these effects can be simultaneously mo…
In the presence of Earth gravity and gravity-gradient forces, centrifugal and Coriolis forces caused by the Earth rotation, the phase of the time-domain atom interferometers is calculated with accuracy up to the terms proportional to the fourth degree of the time separation between pulses. We considered double-loop atom interferometers and found appropriate condition to eliminate their sensitivity to acceleration to get atomic gyroscope, or to eliminate the sensitivity to rotation to increase accuracy of the atomic gravimeter. Consequent use of these interferometers allows one to measure all c…
We demonstrate a proof-of-principle of direct Earth gravity gradient measurement with an atom interferometer-based gravity gradiomter using a single proof mass of cold 87 rubidium atoms. The atomic gradiometer is implemented in the so-called double-loop configuration, hence providing a direct gravity gradient dependent phase shift insensitive do DC acceleration and constant rotation rate. The atom interferometer (AI) can be either operated as a gravimeter or a gradiomter by simply adding an extra Raman $π$-pulse. We demonstrate gravity gradient measurements first using a vibration isolation pl…
Atom interferometers in optical cavities benefit from strong laser intensities and high-quality wavefronts. The laser frequency pairs that are needed for driving Raman transitions (often generated by phase modulating a monochromatic beam) form multiple standing waves in the cavity, resulting in a periodic spatial variation of the properties of the atom-light interaction along the cavity axis. Here, we model this spatial dependence and calculate two-photon Rabi frequencies and ac Stark shifts. We compare the model to measurements performed with varying cavity and pulse parameters such as cavity…
We study the effects of atomic beams harmonic vibrations of micro amplitudes and low frequencies on the mean atomic numbers of the detectors in atomic Mach-Zehnder interferometer, where the two atomic beams are in the same wave surface and have the same phases. We propose a vibrant factor F to quantitatively describe the effects of atomic beams vibrations. It shows that: (i)the vibrant factor F depends on the relative vibrant displacements and the initial phases rather than the absolute amplitudes, (ii)the factor F increases with the increase of the initial phases, and (iii)the frequencies can…
Atom interferometry is amongst the most advanced technologies that provides very high-precision measurements. There can exist a number of obscure forces that can interfere with the atoms used in this instrument. In the present work, we are probing possible roles of one such important forces, known as ``blackbody friction force (BBFF)'', that may affect the precisions in the measurements made using atom interferometers based on the Rb and Cs atoms. The BBFF can be generated on atoms due to the black-body radiations emitted by the stray electromagnetic fields present in the experimental set-up a…
In this paper we demonstrate a magnetically guided Cesium (Cs) atom interferometer in the Talbot-Lau regime for inertial sensing with two interferometer schemes, Mach-Zenhder and Ramsey-Borde. The recoil frequency of the Cs atoms and the acceleration along the waveguide symmetry axis is measured. An acceleration measurement uncertainty of $7\times10^{-5}$ m/s$^{2}$ is achieved. We also realize an enclosed area of $0.018$ mm$^{2}$ for rotation measurement. As the first reported magnetically guided Cs atom interferometer, the system limitation and its advantages are discussed.
We study the influence of off-resonant two photon transitions on high precision measurements with atom interferometers based on stimulated Raman transitions. These resonances induce a two photon light shift on the resonant Raman condition. The impact of this effect is investigated in two highly sensitive experiments: a gravimeter and a gyroscope-accelerometer. We show that it can lead to significant systematic phase shifts, which have to be taken into account in order to achieve best performances in term of accuracy and stability.
Guided-wave atom interferometers measure interference effects using atoms held in a confining potential. In one common implementation, the confinement is primarily two-dimensional, and the atoms move along the nearly free dimension under the influence of an off-resonant standing wave laser beam. In this configuration, residual confinement along the nominally free axis can introduce a phase gradient to the atoms that limits the arm separation of the interferometer. We experimentally investigate this effect in detail, and show that it can be alleviated by having the atoms undergo a more symmetri…
We report simultaneous conjugate Ramsey-Bordé interferometers with a sample of low-mass (lithium-7) atoms at 50 times the recoil temperature. We optically pump the atoms to a magnetically insensitive state using the $2S_{1/2} - 2P_{1/2}$ line. Fast stimulated Raman beam splitters address a broad velocity class and unavoidably drive two conjugate interferometers that overlap spatially. We show that detecting the summed interference signals of both interferometers, using state labeling, allows recoil measurements and suppression of phase noise from vibrations. The use of "warm" atoms allows for …
