Long-term drift laser frequency stabilization using purely optical reference

TL;DR

This paper presents a purely optical method for long-term laser frequency stabilization using a thermostated Fabry-Perot interferometer and digital detection, enabling stable and precise control without atomic references.

Contribution

The authors introduce a novel optical stabilization system that prevents long-term frequency drifts and allows precise, referenced scanning of laser frequencies over hundreds of MHz.

Findings

Achieved frequency stabilization with a few MHz precision.

Enabled referenced scanning over several hundred MHz.

Effective stabilization without atomic or molecular references.

Abstract

We describe an apparatus for the stabilization of laser frequencies that prevents long term frequency drifts. A Fabry-Perot interferometer is thermostated by referencing it to a stabilized He-Ne laser (master), and its length is scanned over more than one free spectral range allowing the analysis of one or more lines generated by other (slave) lasers. A digital acquisition system makes the detection of the position of all the laser peaks possible, thus producing both feedback of both the thermostat and the error signal used for stabilizing the slave lasers. This technique also allows for easy, referenced scanning of the slave laser frequencies over range of several hundred MHz, with a precision of the order of a few MHz. This kind of stabilization system is particularly useful when no atomic or molecular reference lines are available, as in the case of rare or short lived radioactive species.