Hannover 2003 – scientific programme

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A: Atomphysik

A 17: Postersitzung 2

A 17.33: Poster

Thursday, March 27, 2003, 16:00–18:30, Poster

A Quantum Tweezer for Atoms — •Florian Schreck, Mark Raizen, Todd Meyrath, Jay Hanssen, and Chih-sung Chuu — RLM14.220, CNLD, UT Austin, 26th + speedway, Austin,TX 78721,USA

Recently our group proposed a method for extracting a desired number of neutral atoms from a trapped Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) [1]. The method consists of moving an attractive quantum dot from the inside to the outside of a BEC. The quantum dot may be generated by red-detuned laser light and acts as a quantum tweezer. By moving at certain speeds, the tweezer can extract a desired number of atoms from the condensate. This scheme might provide a starting point to study multiple particle entanglement and interferometry or eventually simple quantum gate operations with neutral atoms.

We are currently setting up an experimental apparatus which has as one goal the realization of the quantum tweezer. The number of atoms extracted will be determined by measuring the discrete level of fluorescence obtained from a magneto-optical trap, to which the atoms are transferred from the tweezer. The experimental apparatus is very flexible and will permit us a multitude of other experiments, for example the study quantum chaos in the presence of nonlinearities due to the mean field.

[1] R. B. Diener et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 070401 (2002)