A transportable strontium optical lattice clock

TL;DR

This paper presents a compact, transportable strontium optical lattice clock capable of high-precision timekeeping with an estimated uncertainty of 7×10⁻¹⁵, suitable for field applications.

Contribution

It introduces a fully transportable optical clock system based on laser-cooled strontium atoms, demonstrating high reliability and precision in a compact form factor.

Findings

Achieved 10 Hz spectroscopy resolution.

Estimated clock uncertainty of 7×10⁻¹⁵.

System fits within 2 m³ volume.

Abstract

We report on a transportable optical clock, based on laser-cooled strontium atoms trapped in an optical lattice. The experimental apparatus is composed of a compact source of ultra-cold strontium atoms including a compact cooling laser set-up and a transportable ultra-stable laser for interrogating the optical clock transition. The whole setup (excluding electronics) fits within a volume of less than 2 m$^3$. The high degree of operation reliability of both systems allowed the spectroscopy of the clock transition to be performed with 10 Hz resolution. We estimate an uncertainty of the clock of $7\times10^{-15}$.