• DOI:10.1103/PhysRevA.86.053412
• Corpus ID: 54724660

Fast compression of a cold atomic cloud using a blue-detuned crossed dipole trap

@article{Bienaim2012FastCO,
  title={Fast compression of a cold atomic cloud using a blue-detuned crossed dipole trap},
  author={Tom Bienaim{\'e} and Giovanni Barontini and Laure Mercier de L{\'e}pinay and Louis Bellando and Julien Chab{\'e} and Robin Kaiser},
  journal={Physical Review A},
  year={2012},
  volume={86},
  pages={053412}
}

• T. Bienaimé, G. Barontini, +3 authors R. Kaiser
• Published 4 July 2012
• Physics
• Physical Review A

We present the experimental realization of a compressible blue detuned crossed dipole trap for cold atoms allowing for fast dynamical compression (~ 5 - 10 ms) of 5x10^7 Rubidium atoms up to densities of ~ 10^13 cm^-3. The dipole trap consists of two intersecting tubes of blue-detuned laser light. These tubes are formed using a single, rapidly rotating laser beam which, for sufficiently fast rotation frequencies, can be accurately described by a quasi-static potential. The atomic cloud is compressed by dynamically reducing the trap volume leading to densities close to the Ioffe-Reggel criterion for light localization.