Raman coupling in atomic Bose-Einstein condensed with phase-locked laser system

Abstract

We present a simple, versatile and reliable phase-locked laser system. The system consists of an external cavity diode laser, Ti: Sapphire laser, fast detector, phase frequency detector (PFD) and loop filters. The beat signal of the laser is detected with a detector. From the PFD, we can obtain an error signal. The loop filter converts the output of the PFD into a control voltage and thus drives piezoelectric ceramic transducer (PZT) and current of diode laser. After locking, the bandwidth of the beat signal is reduced form MHz to Hz. So the line-width of the diode laser is almost close to that of Ti: Sapphire laser. The locking range is from sub-MHz to 10 GHz. So it is used for the ground hyperfine state transition of 87Rb. Through the use of the phase-locked loop system, we can drive the transition of 87Rb atoms between two ground hyperfine states F=2 and 1. The system is used to demonstrate Raman transition between two states through changing the detuning of the beat signal. From this, we can obtain Rabi frequency = 10 kHz. So, this system can be used to induce an effective vector gauge potential for 87Rb Bose-Einstein condensed and realize the spin-orbit coupling.