中国物理B ›› 2016, Vol. 25 ›› Issue (6): 60601-060601.doi: 10.1088/1674-1056/25/6/060601

• SPECIAL TOPIC—Soft matter and biological physics (Review) • 上一篇    下一篇

Microwave interrogation cavity for the rubidium space cold atom clock

Wei Ren(任伟), Yuan-Ci Gao(高源慈), Tang Li(李唐), De-Sheng Lü(吕德胜), Liang Liu(刘亮)   

  1. 1 Key Laboratory of Quantum Optics and Center of Cold Atom Physics, Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China;
    2 School of Electronic Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
  • 收稿日期:2016-01-28 修回日期:2016-03-24 出版日期:2016-06-05 发布日期:2016-06-05
  • 通讯作者: De-Sheng Lü, Liang Liu E-mail:dslv@siom.ac.cn;liang.liu@siom.ac.cn
  • 基金资助:

    Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 11034008), the Fund from the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (Grant No. 2013YQ09094304), and the Youth Innovation Promotion Association, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Microwave interrogation cavity for the rubidium space cold atom clock

Wei Ren(任伟)1, Yuan-Ci Gao(高源慈)2, Tang Li(李唐)1, De-Sheng Lü(吕德胜)1, Liang Liu(刘亮)1   

  1. 1 Key Laboratory of Quantum Optics and Center of Cold Atom Physics, Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China;
    2 School of Electronic Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, China
  • Received:2016-01-28 Revised:2016-03-24 Online:2016-06-05 Published:2016-06-05
  • Contact: De-Sheng Lü, Liang Liu E-mail:dslv@siom.ac.cn;liang.liu@siom.ac.cn
  • Supported by:

    Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 11034008), the Fund from the Ministry of Science and Technology of China (Grant No. 2013YQ09094304), and the Youth Innovation Promotion Association, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

摘要:

The performance of space cold atom clocks (SCACs) should be improved thanks to the microgravity environment in space. The microwave interrogation cavity is a key element in a SCAC. In this paper, we develop a microwave interrogation cavity especially for the rubidium SCAC. The interrogation cavity has two microwave interaction zones with a single feed-in source, which is located at the center of the cavity for symmetric coupling excitation and to ensure that the two interaction zones are in phase. The interrogation cavity has a measured resonance frequency of 6.835056471 GHz with a loaded quality factor of nearly 4200, which shows good agreement with simulation results. We measure the Rabi frequency of the clock transition of the rubidium atom in each microwave interaction zone, and subsequently demonstrate that the distributions of the magnetic field in the two interaction zones are the same and meet all requirements of the rubidium SCAC.

关键词: interrogation cavity, microwave interaction, phase, quality factor

Abstract:

The performance of space cold atom clocks (SCACs) should be improved thanks to the microgravity environment in space. The microwave interrogation cavity is a key element in a SCAC. In this paper, we develop a microwave interrogation cavity especially for the rubidium SCAC. The interrogation cavity has two microwave interaction zones with a single feed-in source, which is located at the center of the cavity for symmetric coupling excitation and to ensure that the two interaction zones are in phase. The interrogation cavity has a measured resonance frequency of 6.835056471 GHz with a loaded quality factor of nearly 4200, which shows good agreement with simulation results. We measure the Rabi frequency of the clock transition of the rubidium atom in each microwave interaction zone, and subsequently demonstrate that the distributions of the magnetic field in the two interaction zones are the same and meet all requirements of the rubidium SCAC.

Key words: interrogation cavity, microwave interaction, phase, quality factor

中图分类号:  (Time and frequency)

  • 06.30.Ft
37.30.+i (Atoms, molecules, andions incavities) 42.62.Eh (Metrological applications; optical frequency synthesizers for precision spectroscopy) 32.30.Bv (Radio-frequency, microwave, and infrared spectra)