Trapping Rydberg Atoms in an Optical Lattice

Abstract

Rubidium Rydberg atoms are laser excited and subsequently trapped in a one-dimensional optical lattice (wavelength 1064 nm). Efficient trapping is achieved by a lattice inversion immediately after laser excitation using an electro-optic technique. The trapping efficiency is probed via analysis of the trap-induced shift of the two-photon microwave transition 50S→51S. The inversion technique allows us to reach a trapping efficiency of 90%. The dependence of the efficiency on the timing of the lattice inversion and on the trap laser power is studied. The dwell time of 50D(5/2) Rydberg atoms in the lattice is analyzed using lattice-induced photoionization.

Forbidden atomic transitions driven by an intensity-modulated laser trap

“…Immediately after Rydberg-atom excitation, the lattice is inverted using an electro-optic component, required to efficiently trap Rydberg atoms at intensity minima. The Rydberg atoms are trapped in the optical field using the energy shift of the quasi-free Rydberg electron 11 . During a data scan, the Rydberg atom excitation laser wavelength is tuned so as to produce Rydberg atoms in the optical lattice at an average of 0.5 Rydberg atoms per experimental cycle.…”

“…Rydberg-atom optical lattices are an ideal tool for this demonstration because the atoms' electronic probability distributions can extend over several wells of the optical lattice 11 , and Rydberg-Rydberg transitions are in the microwave regime 12 , a regime in which light-modulation technology exists. To further illuminate the use of such an intensity-modulated optical lattice for a demonstration of ponderomotive spectroscopy, we briefly examine the physics underlying the interaction between the Rydberg atom and the lattice light.…”

Ionization of Rydberg atoms by standing-wave light fields

“…The ingoing lattice beam is focused to a full-width at halfmaximum (FWHM) of the intensity profile of 13 mm. The return beam has a FWHM of 25 mm, which is larger than the ingoing beam focus due to cumulative aberrations caused by the optical components in the retro-reflection beam path 28 . Also, the optical components in the beam path reduce the power of the return lattice beam at the location of the atoms to 0.56 times that of the ingoing beam.…”

“…To prepare the initial Rydbergatom centre-of-mass positions near either intensity maxima or minima in the lattice, we use an electro-optic modulator to apply a controllable phase shift to the lattice's return beam immediately following Rydberg excitation 28 . Ground-state atoms in our lattice are collected at intensity maxima as the lattice light is reddetuned relative to the 5S-5P transition of Rb.…”

Quantum teleportation and computation with Rydberg atoms in an optical lattice

“…7(a) and (b)) (Anderson et al 2011) provides the possibility for doing quantum simulation (Weimer et al 2010) and adiabatic quantum computation (Keating et al 2012). Cubic lattices generated by superimposing three independent standing waves is the main way for trapping atoms.…”