Underground operation at best sensitivity of the mobile LNE-SYRTE Cold Atom Gravimeter

TL;DR

This paper reports the achievement of the best short-term sensitivity for a cold atom gravimeter in an underground environment, demonstrating its potential for geophysical applications without vibration isolation.

Contribution

It presents the first demonstration of ultra-sensitive cold atom gravimetry in a low-noise underground setting without vibration isolation.

Findings

Achieved sensitivity of 10^{-8} m/s^2 in 100 seconds

Demonstrated high sensitivity without ground vibration isolation

Validated underground environment for precision gravimetry

Abstract

Low noise underground environments offer conditions allowing to assess ultimate performance of high sensitivity sensors such as accelerometers, gyrometers, seismometers... Such facilities are for instance ideal for observing the tiny signals of interest for geophysical studies. Laboratoire Souterrain \`a Bas Bruit (LSBB) in which we have installed our cold atom gravimeter, provides such an environment. We report here the best short term sensitivity ever obtained without any ground vibration isolation system with such an instrument: $10^{-8}$m.s$^{-2}$ in 100 s measurement time.