Laser cooling with a modified optical shaker

TL;DR

This paper presents a simplified and more efficient optical shaker technique for laser cooling that enhances cooling rate, lowers temperature limits, and is easier to implement, with potential for 3D cooling.

Contribution

The authors propose a modified optical shaker that requires only one force measurement per cooling step, simplifying electronics and improving cooling performance.

Findings

Increased cooling rate compared to original method

Reduced minimum achievable temperature by an order of magnitude

Fewer phase jumps needed for effective cooling

Abstract

Some practical improvements are proposed for the "optical-shaker" laser-cooling technique [I.S. Averbukh and Y. Prior, Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 153002 (2005)]. The improved technique results in an increased cooling rate and decreases the minimum cooling temperature achievable with the optical shaker. The modified shaker requires only one measurement of the force on the atoms before each cooling step, resulting in a simplification of the feedback electronics. The force is inferred from the power variations of the transmitted laser beams and is used to determine the best moment at which the cooling steps are applied. The temperature of the atomic system is automatically monitored, which allows maintaining an optimum cooling rate as the temperature decreases. The improved shaker is simple to build, provides a faster rate of cooling, and can work in the microkelvin regime. Numerical modeling shows a reduction by a factor of three in the required number of phase jumps and a lower temperature limit reduced by an order of magnitude compared to the initially proposed shaker. The technique is also extendable to cooling in three dimensions.