A compact setup for 87Rb optical tweezer arrays

TL;DR

This paper presents a compact, accessible experimental setup for creating and controlling 87Rb optical tweezer arrays, featuring a small vacuum system, simplified laser configuration, and real-time control for quantum physics experiments.

Contribution

The authors introduce a simplified, compact setup for 87Rb optical tweezer arrays with real-time feedback, enhancing accessibility for quantum physics research.

Findings

Achieved a laser cooled sample of 2×10^7 atoms at 92 μK.

Demonstrated a 25×25 homogeneous optical tweezer array.

Developed a flexible control system with real-time waveform generation.

Abstract

We describe a simple and compact experimental setup for optical tweezer arrays of 87Rb atoms. This setup includes a compact vacuum system, a single cooling laser, a simple tweezer laser, and a flexible control system. The small vacuum system with only 40 cm length takes advantage of the high atomic flux two-dimensional magneto-optical trap (2D MOT) while maintaining a low background pressure in the 3D MOT chamber ensuring sufficient lifetime of the trapped atoms. Atom number of the laser cooled sample of 2e7 and temperature of 92 uK is achieved. The flexible control system with real-time waveform generator modules (RWG) provides precise control of all the RF devices, and enables real-time feedback control of both the global and individual beams in optical tweezer arrays. An optical tweezer array with 25x25 homogeneous traps is demonstrated. This simple and compact demo setup makes it more accessible to experimental quantum physics.