Coherent population trapping in Raman-pulse atom interferometry

Journal Article · Sat Oct 15 04:00:00 EDT 2011 · Physical Review. A

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVA.84.043613· OSTI ID:22095404

Butts, David L.; Kotru, Krish ^[1]; Kinast, Joseph M.; Radojevic, Antonije M.; Timmons, Brian P.; Stoner, Richard E. ^[2]

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1. Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 (United States)
2. C.S. Draper Laboratory, Incorporated, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 (United States)

Raman pulse atom interferometry is an important modality for precision measurements of inertial forces and tests of fundamental physics. Typical Raman atom optics use two coherent laser fields applied at gigahertz-scale detunings from optical resonance, so that spontaneous emission produces a minor or negligible source of decoherence. An additional consequence of spontaneous emission is coherent population trapping (CPT). We show that CPT produces coherences and population differences which induce systematic effects in Raman pulse atom interferometers. We do not believe that CPT has been previously identified as an error mechanism in Raman pulse atom interferometry. We present an experimental characterization of CPT coherences and population differences induced in laser-cooled cesium atoms by application of Raman pulses at detunings near 1 GHz, commensurate with detunings used in several precision measurement experiments. We are not aware of previous demonstrations of CPT-induced population difference. We argue that CPT effects could induce phase shifts of several milliradians in magnitude for typical experimental parameters and stipulate that these errors can be suppressed by propagation direction reversal in Raman interferometer-based precision measurements.

• OSTI ID: 22095404
• Journal Information: Physical Review. A, Journal Name: Physical Review. A Journal Issue: 4 Vol. 84; ISSN 1050-2947; ISSN PLRAAN
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
ACCURACY
ATOMS
CESIUM
EMISSION
GHZ RANGE 01-100
INTERFEROMETERS
INTERFEROMETRY
LASER RADIATION
LASERS
OPTICS
PHASE SHIFT
PULSES
RESONANCE
TRAPPING