From MOT to BEC using a single crossed-wire pair

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel single crossed-wire atom chip design that efficiently produces a magneto-optical trap and Bose-Einstein condensate, simplifying the process and hardware requirements for ultracold atom experiments.

Contribution

It presents a new atom chip configuration using a single crossed-wire pair for both trapping and cooling atoms into a BEC, supported by theoretical and experimental validation.

Findings

Achieved a MOT with over 10^8 atoms.

Produced a BEC with over 10^4 atoms using the same wire configuration.

Developed a theoretical framework for quadrupole field generation with crossed wires.

Abstract

We demonstrate a new magneto-optical trap (MOT) configuration using a simple pair of crossed wires rotated at 45 deg and an appropriate bias field to generate a MOT of >10^8 atoms. The same pair of wires, with slightly adjusted control parameters, is then used to magnetically trap the atoms and cool them via forced evaporative cooling into a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) with >10^4 atoms. We present the theoretical framework for generating a quadrupole field using a pair of crossed wires with arbitrary rotation angle, along with the atom chip design and fabrication. Finally, we describe the experimental protocols required for BEC production using only a single crossed-wire atom chip.