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Phys. Rev. A 53, R3734 - R3737 (1996)

Laser cooling of cesium atoms in gray optical molasses down to 1.1 μK

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D. Boiron, A. Michaud, P. Lemonde, Y. Castin, and C. Salomon
Laboratoire Kastler-Brossel and Collège de France, 24 rue Lhomond, Paris 75005, France

S. Weyers, K. Szymaniec, L. Cognet, and A. Clairon
LPTF-BNM, Observatoire de Paris, 61 avenue de l'Observatoire, Paris 75014, France

Rapid Communication Received 23 February 1996

We have studied the behavior of cesium atoms cooled in six-beam "gray" optical molasses. Cooling occurs for a laser detuned to the blue side of the 6S1 / 2, F=3→6P3 / 2, F′=2 transition, and a Sisyphus-type effect accumulates the atoms in states not coupled to the light. We measure a minimum temperature of 1.1±0.1 μK at low atomic density. The typical cooling time is on the order of 1 ms. A linear dependence of the temperature versus atomic density is found with a slope of ∼0.6 μK/(1010 atoms/cm3).


©1996 The American Physical Society

URL: http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevA.53.R3734
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.53.R3734
PACS: 32.80.Pj

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