No Arabic abstract
Sensitive and accurate rotation sensing is a critical requirement for applications such as inertial navigation [1], north-finding [2], geophysical analysis [3], and tests of general relativity [4]. One effective technique used for rotation sensing is Sagnac interferometry, in which a wave is split, traverses two paths that enclose an area, and then recombined. The resulting interference signal depends on the rotation rate of the system and the area enclosed by the paths [5]. Optical Sagnac interferometers are an important component in present-day navigation systems [6], but suffer from limited sensitivity and stability. Interferometers using matter waves are intrinsically more sensitive and have demonstrated superior gyroscope performance [7-9], but the benefits have not been large enough to offset the substantial increase in apparatus size and complexity that atomic systems require. It has long been hoped that these problems might be overcome using atoms confined in a guiding potential or trap, as opposed to atoms falling in free space [10-12]. This allows the atoms to be supported against gravity, so a long measurement time can be achieved without requiring a large drop distance. The guiding potential can also be used to control the trajectory of the atoms, causing them to move in a circular loop that provides the optimum enclosed area for a given linear size [13]. Here we use such an approach to demonstrate a rotation measurement with Earth-rate sensitivity.
Point source atom interferometry is a promising approach for implementing robust, high-sensitivity, rotation sensors using cold atoms. However, its scale factor, i.e., the ratio between the interferometer signal and the actual rotation rate, depends on the initial conditions of the atomic cloud, which may drift in time and result in bias instability, particularly in compact devices with short interrogation times. We present two methods to stabilize the scale factor, one relying on a model-based correction which exploits correlations between multiple features of the interferometer output and works on a single-shot basis, and the other a self-calibrating method where a known bias rotation is applied to every other measurement, requiring no prior knowledge of the underlying model but reducing the sensor bandwidth by a factor of two. We demonstrate both schemes experimentally with complete suppression of scale factor drifts, maintaining the original rotation sensitivity and allowing for bias-free operation over several hours.
Multi-loop matter-wave interferometers are essential in quantum sensing to measure the derivatives of physical quantities in time or space. Because multi-loop interferometers require multiple reflections, imperfections of the matter-wave mirrors create spurious paths that scramble the signal of interest. Here we demonstrate a method of adjustable momentum transfer that prevents the recombination of the spurious paths in a double-loop atom interferometer aimed at measuring rotation rates. We experimentally study the recombination condition of the spurious matter waves, which is quantitatively supported by a model accounting for the coherence properties of the atomic source. We finally demonstrate the effectiveness of the method in building a cold-atom gyroscope with a single-shot acceleration sensitivity suppressed by a factor of at least 50. Our study will impact the design of multi-loop atom interferometers that measure a single inertial quantity.
Quantum sensors based on coherent matter-waves are precise measurement devices whose ultimate accuracy is achieved with Bose-Einstein condensates (BEC) in extended free fall. This is ideally realized in microgravity environments such as drop towers, ballistic rockets and space platforms. However, the transition from lab-based BEC machines to robust and mobile sources with comparable performance is a challenging endeavor. Here we report on the realization of a miniaturized setup, generating a flux of $4 times 10^5$ quantum degenerate $^{87}$Rb atoms every 1.6$,$s. Ensembles of $1 times 10^5$ atoms can be produced at a 1$,$Hz rate. This is achieved by loading a cold atomic beam directly into a multi-layer atom chip that is designed for efficient transfer from laser-cooled to magnetically trapped clouds. The attained flux of degenerate atoms is on par with current lab-based BEC experiments while offering significantly higher repetition rates. Additionally, the flux is approaching those of current interferometers employing Raman-type velocity selection of laser-cooled atoms. The compact and robust design allows for mobile operation in a variety of demanding environments and paves the way for transportable high-precision quantum sensors.
Measuring the positions of optical vortices is an essential part in the researches of speckles and adaptive optics. The measurement accuracy is restricted by the performance of optical devices and the properties of optical vortices, such as density and size. In order to achieve high accuracy and wide range of application, the dual shearing-type Sagnac interferometers is proposed using two shearing plates to adjust the precision of optical vortices measurement. The shearing displacements are able to balance the measuring precision and the value of the intensity ratio point to provide optimum measurement performance. This method is useful for the observation of optical vortices with different sizes and densities, especially for the high density condition.
We theoretically propose a scheme to perform rotation sensing in a Whispering-gallery-mode resonator setup. With the assistance of a large detuned two-level atom, which induces the effective coupling between clockwise and counterclockwise propagating modes in the resonator, we realize an effective interferometry with SU(2) algebraic structure. By studying the quantum Fisher information of the system, we find that the estimate accuracy for the angular velocity of the rotation can achieve and even break the Heisenberg limit in linear and nonlinear setup, respectively. The high performance of quantum metrology is proved to be associated with the state compressibility during the time evolution. We hope that our investigation will be useful in the design of a quantum gyroscope based on spinning resonators.