Photoionisation loading of large Sr+ ion clouds with ultrafast pulses

Sébastien Removille (1) , Romain Dubessy (1) , Quentin Glorieux (1) , Samuel Guibal (1) , Thomas Coudreau (1) , Luca Guidoni (1) , Jean-Pierre Likforman (1)

1 MPQ (UMR_7162) - Laboratoire Matériaux et Phénomènes Quantiques

This paper reports on photoionisation loading based on ultrafast pulses of singly-ionised strontium ions in a linear Paul trap. We take advantage of an autoionising resonance of Sr neutral atoms to form Sr+ by two-photon absorption of femtosecond pulses at a wavelength of 431nm. We compare this technique to electron-bombardment ionisation and observe several advantages of photoionisation. It actually allows the loading of a pure Sr+ ion cloud in a low radio-frequency voltage amplitude regime. In these conditions up to 4x10^4 laser-cooled Sr+ ions were trapped.

Mots clés: ion trap; quantum information; photoionisation

Domaines: Physique Quantique [quant-ph]

Sébastien Removille, Romain Dubessy, Quentin Glorieux, Samuel Guibal, Thomas Coudreau, et al.. Photoionisation loading of large Sr+ ion clouds with ultrafast pulses. 2008. ⟨hal-00340119v2⟩