Imaging and addressing of individual fermionic atoms in an optical lattice

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates high-resolution fluorescence imaging and site-specific addressing of individual fermionic potassium atoms in a three-dimensional optical lattice, enabling advanced quantum simulation and many-body physics studies.

Contribution

It introduces a method for imaging and addressing individual fermionic atoms in an optical lattice with high fidelity and site selectivity using EIT cooling and microwave spectroscopy.

Findings

Achieved 94% imaging fidelity per atom.

Maintained atom pinning lifetime of 67 seconds.

Demonstrated patterned site selection within a lattice plane.

Abstract

We demonstrate fluorescence microscopy of individual fermionic potassium atoms in a 527-nm-period optical lattice. Using electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) cooling on the 770.1-nm D$_1$ transition of $^{40}$K, we find that atoms remain at individual sites of a 0.3-mK-deep lattice, with a $1/e$ pinning lifetime of $67(9)\,\rm{s}$, while scattering $\sim 10^3$ photons per second. The plane to be imaged is isolated using microwave spectroscopy in a magnetic field gradient, and can be chosen at any depth within the three-dimensional lattice. With a similar protocol, we also demonstrate patterned selection within a single lattice plane. High resolution images are acquired using a microscope objective with 0.8 numerical aperture, from which we determine the occupation of lattice sites in the imaging plane with 94(2)\% fidelity per atom. Imaging with single-atom sensitivity and addressing with single-site accuracy are key steps towards the search for unconventional superfluidity of fermions in optical lattices, the initialization and characterization of transport and non-equilibrium dynamics, and the observation of magnetic domains.