Hannover 2010 – scientific programme
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Q: Fachverband Quantenoptik und Photonik
Q 7: Precision Measurements and Metrology I
Q 7.5: Talk
Monday, March 8, 2010, 15:00–15:15, M 11
Optical single-ion clock using quantum logic — •Olaf Mandel, Ivan V. Sherstov, and Piet O. Schmidt — QUEST Inst. for Exp. Quantum Metrology, PTB Braunschweig and Leibniz Univ. of Hannover, Germany
We present the status of a recently started project to build a transportable optical clock based on a single aluminum ion. 27Al+ has been chosen as the clock ion since it has a narrow (8 mHz) clock transition at 267 nm which exhibits no electric quadrupole shift and a low sensitivity to black-body radiation. The design goals for the frequency standard are an inaccuracy of 10−17 or better and relative stability of 10−15 in one second.
The 27Al+ "clock ion" will be trapped together with a 40Ca+ ion which will act as a "logic ion" and is used for sympathetic cooling and internal state detection of the clock ion. After interrogating the 27Al+ ion with the clock laser, its internal quantum state will be transferred to the logic ion with techniques developed for quantum information processing. The result of the clock interrogation can then be read out via the 40Ca+ ion (see also [1]).
Clock comparison beyond a fractional uncertainty of 10−16 is only possible via dedicated optical fibers or by direct comparison of two physically close standards. As a consequence, we plan to build a portable system that allows us to travel to other sites and perform frequency measurements at the 10−17 level or below.
[1] C.-W. Chou et al., arXiv:0911.4527v1 [quant-ph] (2009)