Partially ferromagnetic electromagnet for trapping and cooling neutral atoms to quantum degeneracy

Marie Fauquembergue (1) , Jean-Félix Riou (1) , William Guerin (1) , Sadiq A. Rangwala (1) , Frédéric Moron (1) , André Villing (1) , Yann Le Coq (1) , Michel Lécrivain (2) , Philippe Bouyer (1) , Alain Aspect (1)

1 laboratoire Charles Fabry de l'Institut d'Optique / Optique atomique
2 SATIE - Systèmes et Applications des Technologies de l'Information et de l'Energie

We have developed a compact partially ferromagnetic electromagnet to produce a Ioffe-Pritchard trap for neutral atoms. Our structure permits strong magnetic confinement with low power consumption. Compared to the previous iron-core electromagnet, it allows for easy compensation of remnant fields and very high stability, along with cost-effective realization and compactness. We describe and characterize our apparatus and demonstrate trapping and cooling of Rb 87 atoms to quantum degeneracy. Pure Bose-Einstein condensates containing 10^6 atoms are routinely realized on a half-minute cycle. In addition we test the stability of the magnetic trap by producing atom lasers.

Mots clés: ferromagnetic electromagnet; atom trapping; Bose-Einstein condensate; atom laser

Domaines: Autre [cond-mat.other]; Optique [physics.optics]

Marie Fauquembergue, Jean-Félix Riou, William Guerin, Sadiq A. Rangwala, Frédéric Moron, et al.. Partially ferromagnetic electromagnet for trapping and cooling neutral atoms to quantum degeneracy. Review of Scientific Instruments, 2005, 76 (10), pp.103104. ⟨10.1063/1.2090407⟩. ⟨hal-00005837v2⟩