Efficient repumping of a Ca magneto-optical trap
Abstract
We investigate the limiting factors in the standard implementation of the Ca magneto-optical trap. We find that intercombination transitions from the 4 s 5 p 1P1 state used to repump the electronic population from the 3 d 4 s 1D2 state severely reduce the trap lifetime. We explore seven alternative repumping schemes theoretically and investigate five of them experimentally. We find that all five of these schemes yield a significant increase in the trap lifetime and consequently improve the number of atoms and peak atom density by as much as ∼20 times and ∼6 times, respectively. One of these transitions, at 453 nm, is shown to approach the fundamental limit for a Ca magneto-optical trap with repumping only from the dark 3 d 4 s 1D2 state, yielding a trap lifetime of ∼5 s.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review A
- Pub Date:
- September 2017
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevA.96.033402
- Bibcode:
- 2017PhRvA..96c3402M