Determination of the Fine Structure Constant Based on Bloch Oscillations of Ultracold Atoms in a Vertical Optical Lattice

Journal Article · Fri Jan 27 00:00:00 EST 2006 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.96.033001· OSTI ID:20776980

Clade, Pierre; Mirandes, Estefania de; Cadoret, Malo; Schwob, Catherine; Nez, Francois; Julien, Lucile; Biraben, Francois ^[1]; Guellati-Khelifa, Saieda ^[2]

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1. Laboratoire Kastler Brossel, Ecole Normale Superieure, CNRS, UPMC, 4 place Jussieu, 75252 Paris Cedex 05 (France)
2. INM, Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers, 292 rue Saint Martin, 75141 Paris Cedex 03 (France)

We report an accurate measurement of the recoil velocity of {sup 87}Rb atoms based on Bloch oscillations in a vertical accelerated optical lattice. We transfer about 900 recoil momenta with an efficiency of 99.97% per recoil. A set of 72 measurements of the recoil velocity, each one with a relative uncertainty of about 33 ppb in 20 min integration time, leads to a determination of the fine structure constant {alpha} with a statistical relative uncertainty of 4.4 ppb. The detailed analysis of the different systematic errors yields to a relative uncertainty of 6.7 ppb. The deduced value of {alpha}{sup -1} is 137.035 998 78(91)

• OSTI ID: 20776980
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Vol. 96, Issue 3; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.96.033001; (c) 2006 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0031-9007
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS
ATOMS
BLOCH THEORY
ERRORS
FINE STRUCTURE
OSCILLATIONS
PHOTON-ATOM COLLISIONS
RECOILS
RUBIDIUM 87