Berlin 2001 – scientific programme

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Q: Quantenoptik

Q 32: Poster: Laser Spectroscopy

Q 32.3: Poster

Friday, April 6, 2001, 12:30–15:00, AT2

A Diode Laser with High Frequency Stability — •Hardo Stoehr, Guido Wilpers, Uwe Sterr, Fritz Riehle, and Jürgen Helmcke — Physikalisch–Technische Bundesanstalt, Bundesallee 100, D–38116 Braunschweig

Narrow-linewidth diode lasers as tunable, compact, efficient and reliable light sources are important for high-resolution spectroscopy and optical frequency standards. High frequency stability of diode lasers is achieved by prestabilization in an extended-cavity configuration and further locking to a mechanically stable Fabry-Perot cavity by using the Pound-Drever-Hall technique. Previously we realized a diode-laser spectrometer at 657 nm with a measured beat-linewidth of <<0.6 kHz in 10 s that is applied for optical Ramsey-Bordé spectroscopy of neutral Calcium atoms [1]. Aiming at a linewidth reduction by approximately 3 orders of magnitude we now use a high-finesse ULE-cavity with 20 kHz linewidth resting fixed in a small vacuum chamber. We present our concepts of vibrational isolation of the vacuum chamber, active and passive thermal isolation and investigations of the mechanical, thermal and optical properties of the high-finesse cavity. Further we describe our laser stabilization scheme that includes an intracavity EOM providing high-frequency correction of laser frequency noise and present first results for the frequency stability.
Supported by DFG under SFB407.

[1] V. Vassiliev, V. Velichansky, P. Kersten, T. Trebst, and F.Riehle, Opt. Lett. 23, 1229 (1998)