Site-resolved imaging of single atoms with a Faraday quantum gas microscope

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a non-destructive, site-resolved imaging technique for single atoms using a Faraday effect-based quantum gas microscope, enabling potential quantum feedback control of many-body systems.

Contribution

It introduces a Faraday-based quantum gas microscopy method with high resolution and non-destructive measurement capabilities, advancing quantum imaging technology.

Findings

Achieved a Faraday rotation angle of 3.0 degrees for a single atom

Confirmed the non-destructive nature of Faraday imaging through detuning dependence analysis

Compared absorption and dark field Faraday imaging, explaining differences with theory

Abstract

We successfully demonstrate a quantum gas microscopy using the Faraday effect which has an inherently non-destructive nature. The observed Faraday rotation angle reaches 3.0(2) degrees for a single atom. We reveal the non-destructive feature of this Faraday imaging method by comparing the detuning dependence of the Faraday signal strength with that of the photon scattering rate. We determine the atom distribution with deconvolution analysis. We also demonstrate the absorption and the dark field Faraday imaging, and reveal the different shapes of the point spread functions for these methods, which are fully explained by theoretical analysis. Our result is an important first step towards an ultimate quantum non-demolition site-resolved imaging and furthermore opens up the possibilities for quantum feedback control of a quantum many-body system with a single-site resolution.