Absolute frequency measurement of molecular iodine hyperfine transitions at 554 nm and its application to stabilize a 369 nm laser for Yb+ ions cooling

TL;DR

This paper precisely measures the hyperfine transition frequencies of molecular iodine near 554 nm using an optical frequency comb, and applies this to stabilize a 369 nm laser for Yb+ ion cooling, enhancing frequency metrology and quantum information applications.

Contribution

It provides high-precision absolute frequency measurements of iodine hyperfine transitions at 554 nm and demonstrates laser stabilization for Yb+ ion cooling.

Findings

Achieved 5E-12 frequency stability over 1000 seconds.

Measured 13 hyperfine transition frequencies with high accuracy.

Enabled stable 369 nm laser for quantum applications.

Abstract

We investigate 13 hyperfine structures of transition lines of 127I2 near 554 nm, namely, the R(50) 22-0, P(46) 22-0, P(121) 24-0, P(69) 25-1, R(146) 25-0, R(147) 28-1, P(160) 26-0, P(102) 26-1, R(96) 23-0, R(49) 22-0, P(45) 22-0, P(92) 23-0, and R(72) 25-1 transitions, and measure their absolute frequencies with an optical frequency comb. A 369 nm frequency-tripled laser is frequency stabilized by locking the 554 nm harmonic-frequency laser to the R(146) 25-0 a15 line of 127I2 via modulation transfer spectroscopy. A frequency stability of 5E-12 is observed over a 1000 s integration time. The measurement of the molecular iodine spectroscopy at 554 nm enriches high-precision experimental data, and also enables theoretical predictions. Meanwhile, the 369 nm frequency-tripled laser stabilized by molecular iodine spectroscopy has wide applications in frequency metrology, and quantum information processing based on Yb+ ions.