Cold-atom inertial sensor without deadtime

Abstract

We report the operation of a cold-atom inertial sensor in a joint interrogation scheme, where we simultaneously prepare a cold-atom source and operate an atom interferometer in order to eliminate dead times. Noise aliasing and dead times are consequences of the sequential operation which is intrinsic to cold-atom atom interferometers. Both phenomena have deleterious effects on the performance of these sensors. We show that our continuous operation improves the shortterm sensitivity of atom interferometers, by demonstrating a record rotation sensitivity of 100 nrad.s −1 / √ Hz in a cold-atom gyroscope of 11 cm 2 Sagnac area. We also demonstrate a rotation stability of 1 nrad.s −1 after 10 4 s of integration, improving previous results by an order of magnitude. We expect that the continuous operation will allow cold-atom inertial sensors with long interrogation time to reach their full sensitivity, determined by the quantum noise limit.