Sisyphus Optical Lattice Decelerator

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a novel Sisyphus optical lattice decelerator for cooling strontium atoms, offering lower temperatures and additional cooling per scattering event compared to traditional laser cooling, with potential applications for exotic species.

Contribution

Introduces a new Sisyphus cooling technique using an optical lattice for efficient atom cooling, compatible with other methods and suitable for exotic species.

Findings

Achieves lower temperatures than radiation pressure cooling.

Provides additional cooling per scattering event.

Compatible with other laser cooling techniques.

Abstract

We experimentally demonstrate a variation on a Sisyphus cooling technique that was proposed for cooling antihydrogen. In our implementation, atoms are selectively excited to an electronic state whose energy is spatially modulated by an optical lattice, and the ensuing spontaneous decay completes one Sisyphus cooling cycle. We characterize the cooling efficiency of this technique on a continuous beam of Sr, and compare it with radiation pressure based laser cooling. We demonstrate that this technique provides similar atom number for lower end temperatures, provides additional cooling per scattering event and is compatible with other laser cooling methods. This method can be instrumental in bringing new exotic species and molecules to the ultracold regime.