Session B1: Matter Optics and Atom Chips

10:30 AM–12:54 PM, Wednesday, May 18, 2005
Burnham Yates Conference Center Room: Ballroom I

Chair: Herman Batelaan, University of Nebraska

Abstract ID: BAPS.2005.DAMOP.B1.2

Abstract: B1.00002 : An Atom Michelson Interferometer on a Chip

11:06 AM–11:42 AM

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Author:

  Dana Z. Anderson
    (Department of Physics, University of Colorado, and JILA, University of Colorado and National Institute of Standards and Technology)

An atom Michelson interferometer is implemented on an ``atom chip.'' The chip uses lithographically patterned conductors and external magnetic fields to produce and guide a Bose-Einstein condensate. Splitting, retroreflecting, and recombining of condensate atoms are achieved within the magnetic waveguide by a standing-wave light field having a wave vector aligned along the guide. Splitting and recombining are achieved with a pair of standing light field pulses each 20 $\mu $s in duration and separated by 63 $\mu $s. This pair of pulses is such that an a single BEC cloud initially at rest is converted into a pair of oppositely directed clouds having momentum $p=\pm 2\hbar k$ with essentially no atoms remaining stationary or in higher diffracted orders. Retroreflection of the two clouds is achieved by a longer (150 $\mu $s) pulse of the standing wave. When the atoms have returned to their starting position, the recombining pulse pair leaves the atoms in three clouds representing two different states: one cloud with zero momentum, $\left| {p=0} \right\rangle $ and a pair of clouds representing the state $\left| {p=\pm 2\hbar k} \right\rangle $. The population of these two states corresponds to the intensity of light from the two output ports of the beamsplitter in an optical Michelson interferometer. A differential phase shift between the two arms of the atom interferometer is introduced either with a magnetic-field gradient or with an initial condensate velocity. The populations of the two states is seen to vary sinusoidally and in anti-phase with the path difference as expected. We find that the interference contrast decays with propagation time in the waveguides: 20{\%} contrast is observed with an atom propagation time of 10 ms.

To cite this abstract, use the following reference: http://meetings.aps.org/link/BAPS.2005.DAMOP.B1.2