Cold-atom gravimetry with a Bose-Einstein condensate

J. E. Debs*, P. A. Altin, T. H. Barter, D. Döring, G. R. Dennis, G. McDonald, R. P. Anderson, J. D. Close, N. P. Robins

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    108 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    We present a cold-atom gravimeter operating with a sample of Bose-condensed 87Rb atoms. Using a Mach-Zehnder configuration with the two arms separated by a two-photon Bragg transition, we observe interference fringes with a visibility of (83±6)% at T=3 ms. We exploit large momentum transfer (LMT) beam splitting to increase the enclosed space-time area of the interferometer using higher-order Bragg transitions and Bloch oscillations. We also compare fringes from condensed and thermal sources and observe a reduced visibility of (58±4)% for the thermal source. We suspect the loss in visibility is caused partly by wave-front aberrations, to which the thermal source is more susceptible due to its larger transverse momentum spread. Finally, we discuss briefly the potential advantages of using a coherent atomic source for LMT, and we present a simple mean-field model to demonstrate that with currently available experimental parameters, interaction-induced dephasing will not limit the sensitivity of inertial measurements using freely falling, coherent atomic sources.

    Original languageEnglish
    Article number033610
    JournalPhysical Review A - Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Physics
    Volume84
    Issue number3
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 9 Sept 2011

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