87

Rubidium Bose-Einstein Condensates in Optical
LatticesbyGretchen K. Campbell
Submitted to the Department of Physics
in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree ofDoctor of Philosophy
at theMASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
September 2006
c Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2006. All rights reserved.

Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Department of Physics
September, 2006
Certified by . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Wolfgang Ketterle
John D. MacAurthur Professor of Physics
Thesis Supervisor
Certified by . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
David E. Pritchard
Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Physics
Thesis Supervisor
Accepted by . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Thomas J. Greytak
Professor of Physics, Associate Department Head for Education

87

Rubidium Bose-Einstein Condensates in Optical Lattices
byGretchen K. Campbell
Submitted to the Department of Physics
on September, 2006, in partial fulfillment of therequirements for the degree ofDoctor of Philosophy

Abstract
Bose-Einstein condensates in optical lattices have proven to be a powerful tool forstudying a wide variety of physics. In this thesis a series of experiments using opticallattices to manipulate 87 Rb Bose-Einstein condensates are described.
A systematic shift of the photon recoil momentum due to the index of refractionof a dilute gas of atoms has been observed. The recoil frequency was measured
interferometrically using a two-pulse Ramsey interferometer. The two pulses werecreated using a one dimensional optical lattice. By measuring the resulting frequency
as a function of the lattice detuning from the atomic resonance, we found a distinctive
dispersive shape for the recoil frequency that fit the recoil momentum as nr ~k.
A one-dimensional optical lattice was used to modify the dispersion relation of thecondensate in order to demonstrate the matter-wave analogue of Optical Parametric
Generation (OPG) and Amplification (OPA) of photons. A condensate was loaded
into a moving optical lattice with adjustable quasimomentum k0 . As the value for k0
was varied, we observed elastic scattering into two distinct final momentum states k1
and k2 . When a small fraction of atoms was first transferred to k1 before ramping on
the lattice, we observed the amplification of scattered atoms into k1 and k2 .
The superfluid-Mott Insulator transition was studied using microwave spectroscopy
in a deep three-dimensional optical lattice. Using the density dependent clock shift
we were able to spectroscopically distinguish sites with different occupation numbers,
and to directly image sites with occupation number from 1 to 5, revealing the shellstructure of the Mott Insulator phase.
Thesis Supervisor: Wolfgang Ketterle
Title: John D. MacAurthur Professor of Physics
Thesis Supervisor: David E. Pritchard
Title: Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Physics

Acknowledgments
During my time at MIT, there are a number of people who have improved my life
both inside and outside the lab. From my early days at MIT, the Ketterle-Pritchardgroup functioned as a family, albeit a slightly dysfunctional one, and I have received
a tremendous amount of help and support during my time here.
First, I’d like to thank my advisors, Wolfgang Ketterle and Dave Pritchard. Daveand Wolfgang have very different advising styles, and I’ve benefited greatly from eachof them. Wolfgang has a wonderful ability to make almost anything seem exciting andimportant. Whenever I was feeling discouraged a few minutes in Wolfgang’s officewould leave me feeling inspired and ready to jump back into the lab. Even today,
when I hear him talking to prospective students it makes me want to join his groupall over again.
I’ve spent many hours in Dave’s office discussing physics, as well as a wide variety
of other topics. I’ve both enjoyed and learned quite a bit during these conversations,and have appreciated his frank advice other the years. Dave can always tell whenyour glossing over details you don’t understand, and makes sure you do the end of
the conversation. Dave also gave me the opportunity to crew on his sailboat. Not
only did this get me out of the lab and into the sun for a few hours each week, butrace day was by far my favorite day. I’ll miss sailing a great deal out in landlocked
Boulder.
When I joined the Rubidium lab, back in the fall of 2001, the lab was just barely
one year old. I had the benefit of joining a great group of people: Yoshio Torii,
Dominik Schneble, Micah Boyd, Erik Streed and Pavel Gorelik. My early days in thelab were spent working with Dominik Schneble. Dominik took me under his wing,taught me the ways of the lab, and was always full of encouragement and support.
He was also great fun to work, I have fond memories of his rapping skills, the days
when we spoke only in rhyme, and his awesome use of “Natural voices”.
During my time at MIT, I’ve overlapped the most with Micah Boyd. Micah has
been both a great labmate and a great friend. I can’t imagine what my experiencewould have been like without him. Given the right supplies Micah can fix almost
anything, and usually in very creative ways. Micah could always tell when I was
having a bad day, and did his best to fix it. I can’t thank him enough for his help,
support, procrastination ideas and fashion advice, both inside and outside the lab.
Erik Streed has an encyclopedic knowledge of all things physics. Whenever I
wanted to know where to look things up, or where to find an obscure part Erik could
always point me in the right direction. Erik has a unique way of approaching physics
and life in general. My skills as a physicists, and problem solver in general wereincreased through my interactions with Erik.
A year after I arrived at MIT, Jongchul Mun joined the rubidium lab. Jongchul
and I have spent many marathon nights in the lab together. Jongchul is a carefulscientist and an excellent running mate, in addition to having a great laugh. I’ve
enjoyed all of our nights watching baseball in the lab, and have a particular fondness
for the long nights we spent during the lattice experiments, where we watched live
broadcasts of Korean baseball at 5 am in the morning. The most recent addition
to the group is Patrick Medley, Patrick brought a huge amount of enthusiasm andenergy into the lab. Under Jongchul and Patrick’s leadership I’m sure the Rubidium
lab will have much success in the future. I’d also like to thank Luis Marcassa, who
has spent the last year here on sabbatical. Luis is an incredibly friendly guy, and was
willing to do almost anything in order to help out the lab.
In my first years at MIT I benefited from great advice from Ananth Chikkatur,
Deep Gupta, and Zoran Hadzibabic, and I was always impressed with Johnny Vogels
excitement and enthusiasm. When I first started working late in the lab, every nighteither Jamil Abo-Shaeer or Aaron Leanhardt would appear and make sure I got homesafe. For three years one of them always made sure to either drive or walk me home.
Aaron Leanhardt has been a good friend over the years, to the extent of even joining
the Rubidium lab. I learned a great deal from him about how to be a scientist, andthe recent successes in the Rubidium lab would not have happened without him.
Jamil Abo-Shaeer is the big brother I always wished for. Jamil looked out for me,
and made building 26 a fun place to be. Since his graduation the hallway has been amuch quieter (though safer) place to be. Jamil is a good friend and continues to help
me in countless ways.
Tom Pasquini has been an excellent officemate, and never once complained about
my messy desk. Tom is a good friend, and I’ve appreciated his sense of humor. He
has always helped me to keep things in context and I’ll miss our discussions. His
handiwork never ceases to amaze me, and he also deserves my gratitude for helping
to convince MIT to pay for our health insurance. Dan Miller has taken on the role ofgroup party thrower, as well as all around instigator. From his April Fools day jokes,
to his Eco-Dan fall foliage tour, he’s helped keep group morale high. I look forward
to hiking with Dan (and singing his name) out in Colorado.
Whenever I needed someone to be either incredibly happy or incredibly angry on
my behalf, I could always count on Martin Zweirlein. Martin is an amazing scientist
and I’ve enjoyed our countless coffee breaks over the years. His passion for physics
is second to none, and I’m glad the hallway will not be without his good cheer for
long. Michelle Saba was always full of thoughtful advice and feedback, and wasalways available to talk physics. He was an invaluable resource for the group, and his
presence both on the hallway, and on the soccer field are missed.
Christian Schunck is by far one of the nicest people I know, and his presence hasbrought a much needed civility to the Lithium lab. In this regard his nemesis would
be Andre Shirotzek, Andre has the distinction of being the only graduate student in
the group to have his own online fan club. Andre is a great guy, and he’s introduced
me to a lot of great music which helped to produce this thesis. I shared a memorable
trip to Barcelona, with Claudiu Stan, Yong-Il Shin, and Takashi Mukayiama, andhad a great time wandering the streets of Barcelona with them.
If the Ketterle-Pritchard group was like a family, the late Carol Costa was oursurrogate mother. Carol looked out for everyone, she was always in tune to how people
were feeling, and made sure everyone was taken care of. Carol is deeply missed within
the group.
I’d also like to thank a few other people with whom I’ve interacted in the group:
Ellenor Emery Barish, Caleb Christensen, Gyu-Boong Jo, Joanna Keseberg, Yingmei

Liu, Sebastian Will, Kaiwen Xu and Peter Zarth. I’d also like to thank the RLE
support staff, and in particular Al McGurl and Bill Gibbs. Al and Bill have always
been helpful and friendly over the years and have helped us out of many jams.
Much of my first year at MIT was spent doing problem sets and studying for
general exams with Cort Johnson, and Qudsia Jabeen Ejaz. Without their help andassistance these times would have been much more difficult, and much less fun. I
wish them both the best of luck in the future.
I spent my undergraduate years at Wellesley College where during my first semester
I had Ted Ducas as a lab instructor. Ted’s excitement about physics was contagious,
and when I later decided to major, he became my undergraduate advisor. I thank
Ted for both steering me towards ultracold atoms, and for encouraging me to apply to MIT. During my time at MIT, I’ve enjoyed our Friday afternoon discussions
immensely.
During my years at Wellesley, I also had the good fortune of meeting Rachel Lomasky. During large periods of my graduate school career Rachel was the only person
I consistently saw outside the lab. Rachel helped to keep me sane, kidnapped me awayfrom the lab when I really needed it, and never got offended when I disappeared anddidn’t return her calls for months.
Finally, I’d like to thank my family, particulary my sister Heather and her partner
Tracy. Whenever I needed a break I could always retreat to their home, they havebeen a constant source of support and encouragement for me.

Contents
1 Introduction

13

1.1

The BEC Phase Transition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

14

1.2

Noninteracting Bosons in a Harmonic Trap . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

14

1.3

Atom-Atom Interactions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

15

1.3.1

S-wave Collisions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

16

Weakly Interacting Bosons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

16

1.4.1

The Density Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

17

The Excitation Spectrum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

19

1.5.1

The Bogoliubov Approximation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

19

1.6

BECIV “The Rubidium Lab” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

21

1.7

Outline of this thesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

22

1.4

1.5

2 Bose-Einstein Condensates in Optical Lattice Potentials

24

2.1

Atom-Light Interactions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

24

2.2

Atomic Diffraction from Optical Gratings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

25

2.2.1

The Grating Picture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

25

2.2.2

The Raman Picture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

26

2.2.3

Bragg Scattering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

27

2.2.4

Kapitza-Dirac Scattering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

28

Bose-Einstein Condensates in Optical Lattices . . . . . . . . . . . . .

29

2.3.1

Optical Dipole Traps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

29

2.3.2

Band Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

32

2.3.3

Wannier Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

34

2.3

7

2.3.4

Adiabaticity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

35

2.3.5

Atomic Diffraction from Optical Gratings Revisited . . . . . .

37

2.3.6

Momentum vs. Quasimomentum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

38

3 Photon Recoil Momentum in Dispersive Media
3.1

39

Momentum in Dielectric Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

39

3.1.1

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

40

3.2

Precision Measurements and Atom Interferometry . . . . . . . . . . .

41

3.3

Index of Refraction of a Dilute Atomic Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . .

43

3.4

Experimental Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

45

3.5

The Recoil Frequency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

48

3.5.1

Grating Picture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

52

3.5.2

The Lorentz Force . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

52

The Recoil Momentum in Bragg Processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

53

3.6

Previous Experiments

4 Parametric Generation and Amplification of Scattered Atom Pairs 55
4.1

Nonlinear Atom Optics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

55

4.2

Can a Condensate Collide with Itself?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

56

Collisions in a 1D Optical Lattice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

57

4.3

Parametric Generation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

59

4.4

Parametric Amplification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

61

4.5

Experimental Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

64

4.6

Dynamic Instabilities in Optical Lattices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

65

5 The Superfluid to Mott Insulator Transition in Ultracold Atoms

69

4.2.1

5.1

The Double Well Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

70

5.2

Quantum Phase Transitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

70

5.3

Bose-Hubbard Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

71

5.3.1

The Mott Insulator Transition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

72

5.3.2

Calculating the Phase Diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

72

5.3.3

Excitation Spectrum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

75

8

5.3.4
5.4

Effect of the External Confinement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

76

Studying Condensed Matter Physics with Ultracold Atoms . . . . . .

78

6 Imaging the Mott Insulator Transition using Microwave Spectroscopy 79
6.1

Investigating the Superfluid to Mott Insulator Transition . . . . . . .

79

6.2

Clock Shifts in Magnetically Trapped Condensates . . . . . . . . . . .

81

6.2.1

Two-Photon Microwave Spectroscopy . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

81

6.2.2

Clock Shifts in Optical Lattices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

83

6.3

Experimental Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

83

6.4

Two-Photon Spectroscopy of the Superfluid to MI Transition . . . . .

87

6.5

Imaging the Shell Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

90

6.6

Onsite Interaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

93

6.7

Lifetime of the Shells . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

95

6.8

Lattice Design and Alignment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

97

6.8.1

Lattice Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

97

6.8.2

Lattice Alignment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

99

6.8.3

Technical Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

7 Raman Amplification of Matter Waves

102

7.1

Rayleigh Superradiance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102

7.2

Raman Superradiance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

8 Conclusion and Outlook
8.1

108

The Future of BEC IV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

A Photon Recoil Momentum in Dispersive Media110

B Parametric Amplification

115

C Imaging the Mott Insulator Shells using Atomic Clock Shifts120

D Raman amplification of Matter Waves

125

9Bibliography

130

10

List of Figures
1-1 Variational calculation of the ground state radius . . . . . . . . . . .

18

1-2 Excitation spectrum for condensates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

20

2-1 Bragg scattering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

28

2-2 Kapitza-Dirac scattering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

30

2-3 Optical lattice potential . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

33

2-4 Band structure in the optical lattice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

35

2-5 Separation between the first two energy bands . . . . . . . . . . . . .

36

3-1 Light grating atom interferometer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

41

3-2 Index of refraction in dispersive media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

42

3-3 Hyperfine structure for the 87 Rb D2 transition. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

44

3-4 Index of refraction with π-polarized light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

44

3-5 Experimental setup of light grating interferometer . . . . . . . . . . .

45

3-6 S-wave collision halo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

47

3-7 Interference fringes for ∆ = 520 MHz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

49

3-8 Recoil frequency as a function of detuning ∆/2π . . . . . . . . . . . .

50

3-9 Separation between ±2~krec peaks a function of the detuning ∆/2π .

51

4-1 Optical parametric generation of photons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

56

4-2 Can a condensate collide with itself? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

57

4-3 Collisions in a 1D optical lattices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

58

4-4 Parametric generation of scattered atom pairs . . . . . . . . . . . . .

60

4-5 Parametric amplification of scattered atom pairs . . . . . . . . . . . .

61

11

4-6 Scattering resonance for parametric amplification of atoms . . . . . .

62

4-7 Growth curve for atomic population in quasimomentum states k1 andk2 when the process was seeded. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

63

4-8 Phase matching condition for different lattice depths. . . . . . . . . .

66

4-9 Effect of atom number on instabilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

67

5-1 Phase diagram for the superfluid-Mott insulator transition . . . . . .

74

5-2 Excitations in the MI phase . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

75

5-3 Effect of the external confinement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

77

6-1 Superfluid to MI transition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

80

6-2 Two-photon spectrum of a magnetically trapped condensate.

. . . .

84

6-3 Three-dimensional cubic lattice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

86

6-4 Lattice experimental setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

86

6-5 Two-photon spectroscopy of the superfluid to MI transition . . . . . .

88

6-6 Change in the two-photon linewidth as the lattice depth is increased.

89

6-7 Effect of heating on the two-photon spectra. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

91

6-8 Imaging the shell structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

92

6-9 Measuring the onsite interaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

94

6-10 Lifetime of the shells . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

96

6-11 Lattice setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

98

7-1 Transition from Rayleigh to Raman Superradiance . . . . . . . . . . . 104
7-2 Time evolution of Raman Superradiance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
7-3 Experimental setup for raman superradiance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
7-4 Hyperfine state identification of Raman supperradiance . . . . . . . . 107

12

Chapter 1
Introduction
It has been over a decade now since the first experimental observation of Bose-Einsteincondensation (BEC) in dilute atomic clouds. The advent of BEC opened up a varietyof new research areas. In the early years after the first demonstration of BEC, experiments were focused on studying the fundamental properties of condensation andsuperfluidity, however today BEC is instead being used as a springboard for studying
a number of fields including atom optics, in particular nonlinear atom optics, quantum measurement problems, precision measurements using atom interferometry, andmost recently as a quantum simulator to model more complicated condensed mattersystems.
Given the large number of theses which have preceded this work, as well as thevast number of review papers and books now available on the subject, for the purposesof this thesis I will limit my introduction of BEC to those aspects which are relevantto the work described here. For a more detailed introduction to Bose-Einstein condensation, and the laser cooling and trapping methods used to realize it, I refer toearlier theses [105, 55], review articles [18, 64, 88, 20, 72, 65], and books [92, 98] on
the subject.

13

1.1

The BEC Phase Transition

The phase transition to Bose-Einstein condensation occurs when there is a macroscopic occupation of a single quantum state, where the quantum state is either the
ground state, or a long-lived metastable state. One can think of a Bose-Einstein Condensate as a giant matter wave. For a uniform gas of atoms with number density n,
and at temperature T, the spatial extent of an atom can be described by its deBroglie
wavelength which is given by
λdB = √h,
2πmkB T

(1.1)

where h is Planck’s constant, m is the atomic mass, and kB is the Boltzmann constant.
At room temperature, the deBroglie wavelength is typically much shorter than theinterparticle spacing of the atoms, n−1/3 . However, as the temperature of the gas
decreases, the wavelength increases until n−1/3 ≈ λdB , at this point the atoms start
to overlap and the system undergoes a phase transition to a Bose-Einstein condensate.
We can no longer think of the atoms as being distinguishable and instead there is asingle matter wave created by the overlap of all the individual atoms. One can also
describe the transition in terms of the phase space density of the gas, ρ = nλ3dB , thephase transition to condensation occurs when ρ ≈ 1.

1.2

Noninteracting Bosons in a Harmonic Trap

For N noninteracting Bosons trapped in an external 3D harmonic trap, with
Vext =

m 2 2
ωx x + ωy2 y 2 + ωz2 z 2 ,
2

(1.2)

where ωi is the trap frequency in the ith direction. The energy levels are given by






1
1
1
~ωx + ny +~ωy + nz +~ωz .
ǫ(nx , ny , nz ) = nx +
2
2
2

14

(1.3)

In the condensed state, the atoms are all in the ground state of the system, and theQmacroscopic wavefunction for the system is given by Φ(~r1 , ....., ~rN ) = i φ0 (~ri ), whereφ0 (~r) = mω 3/4
ho

π~

m

2

2

2

e− 2~ (ωx x +ωy y +ωz z )(1.4)

and ωho is the geometric mean of the trap frequencies. The density distribution isn(~r) = N|ψ0 (~r)|2 and the radius of the condensate is given by the harmonic oscillator
length
aho =



~
mωho

1/2

.

(1.5)

For noninteracting bosons in thermal equilibrium the average number of particles
in a given state can be found using the Bose-Einstein distribution,hn(ǫ)i =1e(ǫ−µ)/kB T − 1(1.6)

where hn(ǫ)i gives the number of particles in the energy level ǫ, µ is the chemicalP
potential of the gas andi hn(ǫ)i = N. For large N, and harmonically confinedatoms, this gives a transition temperature ofkB Tc = ~ωho (N/ζ(3))1/3(1.7)

where ζ(3) ≈1.202 is the Riemann Zeta function. The number of atoms in the condensate N0 , at temperature T is given by"

N0 = N 1 −

1.3



T
TC

3 #

.

(1.8)

Atom-Atom Interactions

In the previous section a noninteracting gas of bosons was assumed, however in experiments with alkali atoms this is not the case. Instead atom-atom interactions haveto be taken into consideration. Although atom-atom interactions do not significantly
effect the transition temperature or the condensate fraction, they do effect the density
15

distribution of the cloud, as well as the properties of the condensate. In fact, all of
the work described in this thesis is due to these interactions.

1.3.1

S-wave Collisions

For the typical densities used in BEC experiments with alkali gases (typically between
1012 /cm3 to 1015 /cm3 ), one must only consider two-body interactions, and in addition
at ultracold temperatures only s-wave collisions can occur. For two particles withidentical mass m, the interaction can be described by a delta function potential where
the potential is given by
U(r) =

4π~2 as
δ(r),
m

(1.9)

and as is the s-wave scattering length [92].

1.4

Weakly Interacting Bosons

The effect of s-wave collisions is to add a nonlinear term to the normal Schrödinger
equation. The effective Hamiltonian for the system is

H=

N  2
X
p~
i

i=1

2m



+ V (~ri ) +4π~2 as X
δ(~ri − ~rj ),m i<j(1.10)and the energy of the system is given by
E=N

Z


~2
(N − 1) 4π~2as224dr|∇φ(~r)| + V (~r)|φ(~r)| +|φ(~r)| .
2m
2m
(1.11)As in the noninteracting case, in the condensed state all of the atoms occupy theground state of system, therefore the macroscopic wavefunction is still described by√Q
Ψ(~r1 , ~r2 , ...., ~rN ) = N
φ(~r).
Definingψ(~r)=
Nφ(~r), the density of condensate isi
i=1
given by n(~r) = |ψ(~r)|2 , and Eq. (1.11) can be rewritten as
E=

Z

~2
4π~2 asdr|∇ψ(~r)|2 + V (~r)|ψ(~r)|2 +|ψ(~r)|4
2m
2m


16



(1.12)

where (N − 1) ≈ N for large N.

1.4.1

The Density Distribution

A Variational Approach
In the noninteracting case, the ground state wavefunction was given by Eq. (1.4).
Using Eq. (1.12) we can use a variational approach to find a new ground state wavefunction for the interacting system. Defining the trial wavefunction
ψ(r) =√N mω r

π~2e−mωr r /2~,

(1.13)

where ωr is the variational parameter, and where for simplicity we have assumed
an isotropic harmonic trap with trap frequency ωho. Substituting Eq. (1.13) into
Eq. (1.12), and integrating we find
#
" 
r

2
ωho
mωr3
3
ωr +
+ Nas
E(ωr , ωho) = N~
4
ωr
2π~

(1.14)

minimizing this with respect to ωho, and rewriting in terms of the harmonic oscillatorqlength aho = mω~ho , we find"r #1/4
ar
Nas 2
= 1+
.
aho
ar
π

(1.15)

Fig. 1-1 shows this ratio for typical trap parameters as the condensate number N isincreased.
Thomas-Fermi Approximation
Alternatively for fixed µ, if E − µN is minimized using Eq. (1.12), the result is thetime-independent Gross-Pitaevskii equation
4π~2 as~2 2
2∇ + V (~r) +|ψ(~r)| ψ(~r) = µψ(~r).
−
2m
m
17

(1.16)

6

ar /aho

5
4
3
2
1
0

102

103

104
105
Condensate Number

106

Figure 1-1: Variational calculation of the change in the ground state wavefunction
due to interactions. The radius is given with respect to the harmonic oscillator lengthaho , the radius of the condensate in the noninteracting case. The radius is found forωho = 2π × 100Hz.
As was derived in the variation approach, for large N the ratio of the kinetic energy
to the interaction energy
Ekin
ah o
∝
Eint
N|as |(1.17)

is very small. Therefore, in the Thomas-Fermi approximation, the kinetic energy
term is ignored and the Gross-Pitaevskii equation becomes
4π~2 as2|ψ(~r)| ψ(~r).
µψ(~r) = V (~r) +m
(1.18)The density of the condensate is given byn(r) = |ψ(~r)|2 =m[µ − V (~r)] .
4π~2 as(1.19)For the harmonic potential given in Eq. (1.2), one has a parabolic density distribution,
2µwhere the Thomas-Fermi radius in the ith direction is given by Ri = mω
i

18

1.5

The Excitation Spectrum

1.5.1

The Bogoliubov Approximation

Having found the ground state wavefunction of the condensate in a weakly interacting
system, we can next derive the excitation spectrum for the condensate. To show thiswe again start with the hamiltonian for the system given in Eq. (1.10). However,instead of writing the Schrodinger equation in terms of the condensate wavefunction,
we instead write the Hamiltonian in terms of the creation and annihilation operatorsfor bosons, ψ̂ † (~r) and ψ̂(~r)
H=

Z


~2 2
U0 †
†
†
d~r −ψ̂ (~r)∇ ψ̂(~r) + V (~r)ψ̂ (~r)ψ̂(~r) + ψ̂ (~r)ψ̂ (~r)ψ̂(~r)ψ̂(~r) , (1.20)
2m
2


†

2

where U0 = 4π~m as . To find the excitation spectrum, we include fluctuations in the
ground state of the wavefunction by definingψ̂(~r) = ψ(~r) + δ ψ̂(~r),(1.21)

the average value of the operator plus a small fluctuation term. Using the Heisenberg
equation of motion for the operator,∂
ı~ ψ̂(~r) = [ψ̂(~r), Ĥ] =∂t~ 2 ∇2†−+ V (~r) + U0 ψ̂ (~r)ψ̂(~r) ψ̂(~r),
2m(1.22)and linearizing this equation for ψ̂(~r) in terms of δ ψ̂(~r) gives a set of linear coupledequations for δ ψ̂(~r). This coupled equation is given by∂ı~ δ ψ̂(~r) =
∂t



~2 2
−
∇ + V (~r) δ ψ̂(~r) + U0 δ ψ̂ † (~r)δ ψ̂ 2 (~r) + 2U0 |ψ 2 (~r)|δ ψ̂(~r), (1.23)
2m

and similarly for the hermitian conjugate δ ψ̂ † (~r). The normal mode solutions can befound from these coupled equations, and as shown by Bogoliubov for a uniform gas

195

E[mc2]

4
3
2
1
1

0.5

1.5
q[mc]

2

2.5

3

Figure 1-2: Excitation spectrum for the condensate. The dispersion relation for acondensate (solid line), free particles (dotted line), and for phonons (dashed line) isshown. The free particle cure is offset by mc2 . The momentum is in units of q = mc,
where c is the speed of sound in the condensate.
with V (~r), the Bogoliubov equations become




ǫ
+
nU
−
~ω
−nU
u
0
q
0
 q
 q

= 0 ,

−nU0
ǫq + nU0 + ~ωqvq(1.24)

where ǫq = ~2 q 2 /2m andδ ψ̂(~r) = e−iµt/~Xuj (~r)α̂j e−iωj t + vj∗ (~r)α̂j† eiωj t ,(1.25)jwhere αj († ) annihilate (create) bosonic excitations in the normal mode with frequency
ωj . Eq. (1.24) yields the dispersion relation
~ωq =

q

ǫ2q + 2nU0 ǫq .

(1.26)As shown in Fig. (1-2) for low momenta, the excitations are phonon like with E = ~kcqnU0
where c =is the speed of sound in the condensate. For large momenta themexcitations are particle like with E = ǫq + nU0 .

20

1.6

BECIV “The Rubidium Lab”

The experiments presented in this thesis were all performed in BECIV, the “Rubidium Lab”, the newest of the BEC machines in the Ketterle-Pritchard group. To create
Bose-Einstein condensates, one requires ultrahigh vacuum, a stable laser system, andhigh magnetic fields. The magnetic coils and optics necessary to trap and cool theatoms greatly limits the optical access to the condensate, and the stringent requirements of high vacuum also make switching experiments inside the chamber difficult
and time consuming. To overcome these challenges, a new Rubidium Bose-Einsteincondensate apparatus was built. The goal of the new lab was to build an apparatus
which created condensates in a “production chamber” and then transported themto an auxiliary chamber. The second chamber would allow for better optical accessand also allow for the exchange of experiments without breaking vacuum in the main
production chamber.
I arrived at MIT in the fall of 2001, just a few months before BECIV realized
its first condensate. Building a rubidium BEC apparatus which could both create,
and transport condensates posed some unexpected technical difficulties. My earlydays in the lab focused on optimizing the performance of the new apparatus andimplementing the transport of the condensates to the auxiliary chamber. As detailed
accounts of the design and construction of the machine can be found in Ref.[111, 110],
here I will just highlight some important features of our machine.
Although the majority of Rubidium experiments use double MOTs loaded using
either a dispenser or a vapor cell, our machine instead uses an oven and Zeeman slower
to load the MOT. The atoms are then loaded into a Ioffe-Pritchard Magnetic trap.
After optimizing the performance of the apparatus, rubidium condensates containing
20 million atoms are now consistently produced in the production chamber. This issignificantly larger than other labs which produce rubidium condensates of around 1
million atoms. After first trapping and cooling atoms in the “production chamber”,
ultracold rubidium atoms have been transferred over 30 cm in 1.5 seconds to the auxiliary chamber. The atoms are moved between the chambers by first transferring the21atoms from the magnetic trap to an optical dipole trap created with a single focusedlaser beam (optical dipole trap, or ODT), and by then translating the focus of thebeam from the production chamber to the science chamber. The performance of thetransport was optimized to minimize heating and losses that occurred during acceleration so that the atoms could be evaporatively cooled to a BEC by simply lowering
the depth of the optical trap after transport. Although the transport of cold atoms
with an ODT had been previously demonstrated with sodium condensates [15, 47],
the original design of our apparatus had to be improved to compensate for the higher
mass and larger 3-body decay rate of rubidium. With the successful production ofcondensates in the auxiliary chamber, we can now begin loading the condensates
onto atom optical devices, such as atom chips, waveguides and mirrors, or create optical lattices with significantly better optical access than that in the main production
chamber. Although all the experiments described in this thesis have been performedin the main production chamber, the next generation of lattice experiments will be
performed in the science chamber.

1.7

Outline of this thesis

In recent years optical lattices have proven to be a very versatile tool to study a wide
variety of physics with Bose-Einstein Condensate, the work presented in this thesis
highlights this versatility. All of the experiments presented here use optical standing
waves, however the standing waves are used in very different ways and for very different purposes. The experiments performed here fall into two main categories, atom
optics, both linear and nonlinear, and strongly correlated systems in optical lattices.
The structure of this thesis is as follows: In chapter 2, I give a brief introduction tocondensates in optical lattices, and in particular scattering from light gratings in the
Kapitza-Dirac and Bragg regimes. Chapter 3 is the first chapter with experimental
results. Here I discuss a measurement of the photon recoil momentum in dispersive
media, which was performed by diffracting a condensate off of a one-dimensional lightgrating. In chapter 4 dispersion management is used to demonstrate the matter-wave
22analogue of optical parametric generation and amplification of scattered atom pairs.
In chapter 5 the superfluid-Mott Insulator transition in a deep three-dimensional optical lattice is discussed, and in chapter 6 two-photon microwave spectroscopy is used
to study the superfluid-Mott insulator transition using atomic clock shifts. Chapter 7
briefly discusses the demonstration of Raman superradiance, where a polarization
grating is created from a applied light pulse and an end fire mode, leading to selfstimulated Raman scattering. Finally, in chapter 8, I summarize the work presented
in this thesis and give a brief outlook. The appendices give reprints of the relevant
papers on which this thesis is based.

23

Chapter 2
Bose-Einstein Condensates in
Optical Lattice Potentials
2.1

Atom-Light Interactions

If neutral atoms are placed in an electromagnetic field the atoms develop an induced
electric dipole moment µ, where the interaction energy is given by
U = −µ · E,

(2.1)

where E is the applied electric field. This dipole moment has two main effects, fornear-resonant light the effect is to change the atomic state through the absorption
and emission of photons. Using this effect one can coherently manipulate both theinternal and external states of the atom. For far off-resonant light, the primary effectis an energy shift to the atomic energy levels through the AC stark shift.
In this chapter (and in the rest of this thesis), we focus on optical potentials createdwith standing light waves. The first part of this chapter focuses on the diffraction of
atoms from standing wave potentials where, using near-resonant light, the momentum
state of the atom is coherently controlled. In the second we discuss the use of far
off-resonant beams to create optical lattices potentials, where atoms are trapped in
the nodes of the standing wave potential.
24

2.2

Atomic Diffraction from Optical Gratings

Atomic diffraction from optical gratings has proven to be an ideal tool for atom optics
and atom interferometry. Kapitza-Dirac and Bragg Scattering from optical gratings
were both first demonstrated as coherent beamsplitters for atomic beams of Sodium
atoms [41, 77], and later demonstrated with Bose-Einstein condensates [70, 106, 86].
In the proceeding sections, diffraction from an optical grating is described using two
different models, a more detailed discussion can be found in [46].

2.2.1

The Grating Picture

If a condensate is incident upon a periodic grating, after traversing the grating thecondensate will be diffracted. The maxima of the resulting interference pattern canbe found from the grating equationℓλdB = d sin(θ),(2.2)

where ℓ is the diffraction order, λdB is the deBroglie wavelength as defined in Eq. (1.1),
and d is the grating spacing. Although this equation is typically used to describematerial gratings which modulate the amplitude of the wavefunction, it also holds
true for phase gratings, where a periodic light grating is used to diffract the atoms.
In light gratings, the atoms receive position dependent light shifts, and for wavelength
λ the grating spacing is given by d = λ/2, the spacing of the nodes in the standingwave.
The electric field for a standing wave of light is given by~ t) = f (t) (E0 sin(kz − ωt)ê + E0 sin(kz + ωt)ê)
E(z,

(2.3)

where k = 2π/λ is the wavevector of the grating light, and f (t) is the envelope
function for the standing wave. The light shifts for this field are given by the AC
Stark shift potential,
U(z, t) =~ωR2f (t)2 sin2 (kz)
δ
25

(2.4)

where ωR = µE0 /~ is the Rabi frequency, with µ = he|e~r|gi · ê the dipole matrix
element connecting the ground |gi and excited |ei states of the atom, and δ is thedetuning of the beam. Eq. (2.4) is valid in the limit δ 2 >> Γ2 /4, where Γ is thenatural line width of the excited state.

2.2.2

The Raman Picture

Alternatively, diffraction from the light grating can be described as a stimulated
Raman process, where the initial and final states, instead of being internal states,
are different momentum states. The momentum of the atoms is changed through thestimulated absorbtion and subsequent emission of photons from the standing wave.
The ground, intermediate, and final states for this Raman process are |g, 0i,|e, 1i, and|g, 2i, where |g(e), ℓi is the ground (excited) internal state with momentum p = ℓ~k.
The Hamiltonian for this Raman process is given by
H(t) = H0 (t) + Hint (t),(2.5)

where in the electric dipole approximation
Hint (t) = −µ · E = −ıe−iωt~ωR(|e, 1ihg, 0| − |e, 1ihg, 2|) + h.c.,
2

(2.6)

and
H0 (t) = ~ω0 |e, 1ihe, 1| + ~ωrec (|g, 0ihg, 0| + |g, 2ihg, 2|)(2.7)

where ω0 is the transition frequency between the ground and excited state, and Erec =2~ωrec = (~k)
is the recoil frequency. To avoid scattering atoms into the wrong final
2m
state, the fourier width of the applied light pulse with length τ must be smaller than
the separation between momentum states
τ >>

π
.
4ωrec

26

(2.8)

When this condition is fulfilled, the scattering is in the Bragg regime. If this condition
is not fulfilled than the scattering is described as Kaptiza-Dirac (or Raman-Nath)scattering.

2.2.3

Bragg Scattering

In the Bragg regime, the fraction of atoms scattered into the final state |g, 2i can befound by using the trial wavelength|ψ(t)i = c0 (t)e−ıωrec t |g, 0i + c1 (t)e−ıω0 t |e, 1i + c2 (t)e−ıωrec t |g, 2i.

(2.9)

Subbing this into Schrödinger equation, and solving for c2 (t) one finds the transition
probability(2)

P2 (τ ) = |c2 (t)|2 = sin2

ωR
τ
2

!

,

(2.10)(2)

where ωR = ωR2 /2δ is the two-photon Rabi frequency. This can be extended to an
N th order Bragg process where atoms absorb N photons from one direction, and emit
(2N )N photons into the opposite direction, with Rabi frequency ωr

ω 2N= 22N−1 δ1 δR2 ...δ2N−1 .

For Bragg scattering to occur energy and momentum must be conserved in the
scattering process. Instead of varying the angle and velocity of the condensate relative
to the standing wave it is typically easier to vary the standing wave by adding a small
detuning, δL between the two laser beams used to make the standing wave. The
resonance condition is then given by~2 k 2~δL = 2N
sin2 (θ/2),m(2.11)

where as shown in Fig. 2-1, θ is the angle between the two beams.
Effect of the Mean Field Interaction
As discussed in section 1.5, for particle like excitations in the condensate ~ω = ~ωrec +nU0 , and there is a mean field shift to the resonance frequency. Atoms in the initial

27

(a)

Energy [(hk)2/2m]

(c)

|e>

rp
tio
ab

so

θ
ka

kb

|g>

ed
at n
ul i oim ss
s t mi
e

n

p=0

ν2

ν1

(b)
p=0 p=2h(ka-kb)-4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2
Momentum [hk]3

4Figure 2-1: Bragg scattering (a) In Bragg scattering the atom absorbs a photon fromone beam, and emits the photon into the second. The detuning of the beams are set
such that the atom only absorb photons from one of the beams, therefore atoms are
only scattered in one direction. (b) Since two photons are scattered, the momentumof the atom changes by 2~k (c) Bragg transition diagram. Atoms are only diffracted
when the frequency and angle between the beams is tuned such that both energy andmomentum are conserved.
condensate are indistinguishable, however once atoms have been scattered into thefinal momentum state they are distinguishable and have twice the mean field energy
due to the exchange term in the interaction potential [106], therefore the resonancefrequency is shifted by nU0 , the mean field energy.

2.2.4

Kapitza-Dirac Scattering

In the Kapitza-Dirac, or Raman-Nath regime τ << 1/ωrec. In this limit, the fourier
width of the pulse is larger than the separation between adjacent momentum states,
and atoms can be scattered into higher order momentum states. For short interaction
times, the motion of the atoms during the pulse can be neglected, therefore the kinetic
energy term in Eq. 2.7 can be ignored. The population in a given momentum state
2N~k can be found by looking at the phase shift applied to the atoms by the AC
Stark shift (Eq. (2.4)) during the interaction time,−ı|ψi = |ψ0 ie ~R

dtU (z,t)2

ı2= |ψ0 ie 2δ ωR τ e 2δ ωR τ cos(2kz) .
−ı

28(2.12)

Using an identity for Bessel functions, one finds(2)

PN = JN2 (ωR τ )(2.13)

where JN is the N th order Bessel Function of the first kind. As shown it Fig. 2-2, as
the power is increased the fraction of atoms in higher orders increases.

2.3

Bose-Einstein Condensates in Optical Lattices

In the discussion of diffraction from optical gratings, a few assumptions were made:1) The standing wave was pulsed on for a short period of time. 2) A plane wave wasused. These assumptions allowed us to ignore the external trapping potential createdby the standing wave, and also allowed us to use the excitation spectrum derived in
section 1.5. However if the optical lattice is not pulsed on, but is instead ramped
on these assumptions are no longer valid. In recent years Bose-Einstein condensates
held in optical lattices has become an active research field, and a review of recent
work done with Bose-Einstein condensates in optical lattices can be found in [84]. In
the following section the energy spectrum and ground state wavefunction for BoseEinstein condensates held in optical lattices is discussed. In this chapter only weaklattices are discussed where the system can still be described as a superfluid with amacroscopic wavefunction. In chapter 5 the behavior in deep optical lattices where
this is no longer true is discussed.

2.3.1

Optical Dipole Traps

In Bragg and Kapitza-Dirac scattering, near-resonant laser light is used to manipulate
the final momentum state of the atoms. For optical lattices if near-resonant light isused the high spontaneous scattering rate leads to short condensate lifetimes. If acondensate is illuminated with a laser beam, the resulting potential due to the AC

29

(a)
higher powerà
3 rd order2 nd order
1 st order
0 th order
1 st order2 nd order3 rd order(b)
Fraction of atoms

1.0
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0.0
100

200

300

400

500

Power (mW)

Figure 2-2: Kapitza-Dirac scattering. (a) In Kapitza-Dirac scattering, due to theshort length of the pulse the atom can absorb photons from either of the beams,
and atoms are symmetrically scattered in both directions. As the power in the pulse
is increased atoms are scattered into higher momentum states 2N~k where N is an
integer. (b) The fraction of atoms in a given momentum state can be fit by Bessel(2)(2)
functions as PN = JN2 (ωR τ ), where ωR is the 2-photon Rabi frequency, and τ is thelength of the pulse. The fraction of atoms is shown for the 0th (circles), 1st (squares),and 2nd (triangles) order momentum states.

30

Stark shift can be written as
3πc2
~ωR2
V (r) =
=
δ
2ω03



Γ
Γ
+
ω0 − ω ω0 + ωI(r) ≈

3πc2 Γ
I(r),2ω03 δ

(2.14)

where the natural line width Γ is given by
Γ=

ω03
µ2 ,
3πǫ0 ~c3(2.15)and I is the intensity of the laser beam. Depending on the sign of the detuning theatoms are either attracted or repelled from the region of maximum intensity. The
spontaneous scattering rate from the laser is
3πc2
ΓSC (r) =
2~ω03

 2
Γ
Γ
I(r) = V (r)δ~δ(2.16)

for a given potential depth, the spontaneous scattering rate can be decreased by using
far off-resonant light. Although the above potential is only for two level atoms, formultilevel atoms the potential can be generalized toV (r) =

X cj
3πc2 Γ
I(r)
3
2ω0
δj
j

(2.17)

where δj is the detuning between the ground |gi and the excited state |ej i, andcj = kµk/muj is the relative coupling strength.
The simplest way to trap atoms using the AC Stark shift potential is by using a
focused red-detuned laser beam [5, 17]. The intensity profile of a focused gaussianlaser beam with power P , focused along the z-axis isI(r, z) =

2
2P
−2 2r
w (z)
e
πw 2 (z)where the beam waist along the z-axis is given by w(z) = w0

(2.18)p
1 + (z/zR )2 . The

minimum beam waist at the focus is w0 , and zR = πw02 /λL is the Rayleigh lengthof the focus. If the spatial extent of the condensate is less than the beam waist

31

(RT F << w0 , zR ), then the resulting trapping potential can be approximated as"

Vext (r, z) ≈ V 1 − 2



r
w0

2

−



z
zR

2 #

,

(2.19)

this potential has cylindrical symmetry with trap frequencies ωr =p
ωz = 2V /mzR2 in the radial and axial directions.

p
4V /mw02 andIf a second, counter-propagating beam is added where the frequency, polarization,and power of the beam are identical to the initial dipole trap, than a standing wave
potential is created with"r
Vlat (r, z) = 4V cos (kz) 1 − 2
w0
2

2

−



z
zR

2 #

.

(2.20)As shown in Fig 2-3 the easiest (and most stable) way to create this lattice potential
is by retroreflecting the initial dipole beam. Typically the lattice trap depth Vlat isgiven in terms of the recoil frequency Erec . The lattice trap frequency along the axial
direction is given by~k 2
ωlat =
m

2.3.2

r

Vlat
.
Erec

(2.21)

Band Structure

Ignoring the external trapping potential, the potential due to the lattice can be written
asVlatt (z) = sErec sin2 (kz) =sErec(1 − cos(2kz)),
2(2.22)

where sErec gives the lattice depth in terms of the recoil energy. This potential
is invariant under translation, i.e Vlatt (z + π/k) = Vlatt (z). Therefore from Bloch’s
theorem (see for example [76]) the eigenstates of this potential areψnq (z) = eıqr unq (z)32(2.23)

(a)

(c)

(b)

(d)

Ulatt
x

.5Ulattx

0zz

Figure 2-3: Optical lattice potential. (a) Retroreflected one-dimensional lattice using
a focused gaussian laser beam. (b) The resulting 1D lattice potential. (c) Experimental setup for retroreflected 2D lattice. (d) Resulting 2D potential, where the twolattice beams have either perpendicular polarization or different frequencies.

33

where u(z + π/k) = u(z). The eigenstates are plane waves whose amplitude aremodulated with the same periodicity as the lattice potential. The energy spectrum
has a band structure, where q is the quasimomenta, and n is the band index. Theband energy is found from the Schrödinger equation,
Ĥ|ψnq i = Enq |ψnq i.

(2.24)

Since both the lattice potential, and unq are periodic functions, we can write thenboth as Fourier series
Ψnq (z) = eıqrX

cnj e2ıjkr

(2.25)jU(r) =

X

Um e1ıkr .

(2.26)

m

Subbing these into the Schrödinger equation, and truncating the sum at |j| = jmax ,one finds 2(2jmax ) + 1 linear equations. For our sinusoidal wavefunction this is simplified as only the U±2k = Ulatt /4 and U0 = Ulatt /2 terms are non zero in Eq. (2.26).
For a given quasimomenta, this leads to 2jmax +1 different eigenenergies, which are
the band energies En , with n = 0, 1, ..., 2jmax . If only the first few energy bands areof interest, these equations can be easily solved by truncating j.
Fig 2-4 shows the resulting band structure for a one-dimensional lattice for different lattice depths as a function of the quasimomenta q in the first Brillouin zone.
For 0Erec (i.e no lattice), the band structure is just the quadratic dispersion relation
for free particles. As the lattice depth is increased, a band gap appears between theenergy bands and the dispersion relation flattens out.

2.3.3

Wannier Functions

The Bloch functions given above are plane waves, they are completely delocalized overthe entire lattice sites. As we will see in chapter 5, it is sometimes more convenient
to instead use Wannier functions to describe the behavior of atoms in the lattice.
The Wannier functions are an orthogonal set of wavefunctions which in contrast to

34

20

0 Erec5 Erec10 Erec

15 Erec

Energy [Erec]

15

10

5

0
-hk
hk -hkhk -hkhk -hkhk
0000
quasimomentum
quasimomentum
quasimomentum
quasimomentum

Figure 2-4: Band structure in the optical lattice. Energy of the Bloch state versus
the quasimomentum is shown in the first Brillouin zone is shown for the lowest bands.
Lattice depths of 0 Erec , 5 Erec , 10 Erec , and 15 Erec are shown. As the lattice depth
is increased the band structure flattens out, and the energy gap between the bands
increases.
the Bloch functions are localized wavefunctions at individual lattice sites [76]. The
Wannier function for an atom in the j th lattice site in the nth energy band can beconstructed from the Bloch functions as
1 X −ıqj
e ψnq (z).
wjn (z) = √N q(2.27)

Using the Wannier functions, one can calculate the probability for an atom to tunnel
from the j th to the k th site by calculating the overlap integral between the Wannierfunctions in the two adjacent sites, the tunneling matrix element J is given by
J=

2.3.4

Z



~2 ∂ 2wjn (z) −+ Vlatt wkn (z)dx.
2m ∂z 2(2.28)

Adiabaticity

If a condensate is loaded into the optical lattice adiabatically, it will also be loaded
into the ground state of the optical lattice. For low lattice depths, where the tunneling35

Seperation [Erec]

6
4
2
0
0

5

10
15
Lattice Depth [Erec]

Figure 2-5: Separation between the first two energy bands for q = 0 (solid line),q = 0.5k (dashed line), q = 0.9k (dotted line). The adiabatic condition is easily
fulfilled for q = 0, but becomes more difficult for higher quasimomenta.
rate is high, the condensate can still be described with a macroscopic wavefunction.
In a stationary state the chemical potential is constant throughout the lattice, andthe condensate has quasimomentum q = 0. The adiabaticity condition for loading acondensate with quasimomentum q into the lowest Bloch band, |0, qi of the lattice isgiven by [96]h1, q|∂H|0, qi << ∆E 2 (q, t)/~,∂t(2.29)

where |1, qi is the 1st excited band, and ∆E is the energy gap between the two bands.
Fig 2-5 shows the energy separation for three different quasimomenta. For q = 0, theadiabaticity condition can be met for dVlatt /dt << (4Erec )2 /~, since the separation
between the bands is a minimum at Vlatt = 0 where ∆E = 4Erec . This is theseparation from the free particle dispersion curve. However, as the quasimomentum
increases, the separation at Vlatt = 0 approaches zero, and the adiabaticity condition
becomes more difficult to fulfill.
In addition to being adiabatic with respect to the lattice frequency, as the lattice
depth is increased the external trap frequencies also increase due to the gaussian
beam profile. The lattice ramp must be adiabatic with respect to the external trap
frequencies, and the mean field energy of the condensate.

362.3.5

Atomic Diffraction from Optical Gratings Revisited

In the beginning of this chapter, diffraction from optical gratings was discussed bymodeling it both as a classical grating, and also by modeling it as stimulated ramanprocess. After discussing the band structure for condensates loaded into optical lattices it seems useful to revisit Bragg and Kapitza-Dirac scattering in the context of
nonadiabatic loading of the lattice. If the lattice potential is abruptly turned on,
instead of ramped on adiabatically, the resulting wavefunction is analogous to Bragg
and Kaptiza-Dirac scattering [25].
If a condensate, initially assumed to be a plane wave φq (t) with momentum q at
t = 0 is suddenly loaded into an optical lattice, the wavefunction can be written as asuperposition of Bloch states |n, qi. Where|ψ(t = 0)i =

∞
X
n=0

|n, qihn, q|φq i,(2.30)and hn, q|φq i = cn,q (0). While the lattice is turned on each Bloch function evolves at
its respective eigenenergy, and the condensate wavefunction evolves as∞X|ψ(t)i =n=0cn,q (0)e−ıEn (q)t/~|n, qi.

(2.31)

If the lattice is then suddenly turned off after time τ , the final wavefunction for thecondensate is given by mapping the lattice state back onto the plane wave basis. The
resulting wavefunction is given by|ψ(τ )i =wheredq (j) =

∞
X

∞
X
j=0

dq (j)|φq+2j~k i,cn,q (0)cn,q (j)e−ı

En (q)
τ~(2.32).

(2.33)n=0

The exponential term produces oscillations in the population of the plane wave momentum states as a function of τ , the time the condensate is held in the optical37

lattice. If the condensate is initially created with q = 0, then the initial wavefunction is symmetric, and only even energy bands are populated. The population in the|2j~ki states oscillates with time, and this describes Kapitza-Dirac scattering. The
observed oscillation period is given by the energy gap between the ground and excited
bands at q = 0, which for deep lattices (Ulatt > 5Erec ) is given by the lattice trap
frequency ~ωlatt . If instead of being initially at rest, the condensate is created withinitial momentum, for example in the momentum state q = ~k, then the odd bands
are also populated, and for a shallow lattice this is equivalent to first order Bragg
Scattering.

2.3.6

Momentum vs. Quasimomentum

As a final note, a common confusion when loading condensates into optical lattices
is the difference between momentum and quasimomentum. Due to the translational
symmetry of the lattice, the only physically distinct quasimomenta are in the first
Brillouin zone between q = −k to q = k. But when the lattice is ramped on or off
how does momentum map to quasimomentum and vice-versa? To understand this
it is easiest to look at the “band structure” for the free particle shown in Fig 24(a). If an atom initially has momentum q0 > k, then the energy for the particle
is given by E0 = ~2 q02 /2m, and the atom will be in an excited band, as the lattice
is ramped on, the atom has quasimomentum q0 Mod(2k), but will be in an excitedenergy band. Similarly, if an atom is in the excited energy band n in the lattice,with quasimomentum qL , if the lattice is adiabatically ramped down the atom will
be mapped onto the free particle momentum state |qF | = |qL + nk| with energy
EF = ~2 qF2 /2m.

38

Chapter 3
Photon Recoil Momentum in
Dispersive MediaThis chapter describes a measurement of the photon recoil momentum in dispersive
media, and supplements work previously reported in Ref [63], which is also includedin Appendix A

3.1

Momentum in Dielectric MediaThe transmission of momenta in dielectric media has raised controversy for over 100
years, starting with the papers of Minkowski [79, 80], and Abraham [2, 3] in 1908
and 1909. The main question is as follows, is the momentum density carried by~ × B)/4πc~
an electromagnetic wave in dispersive medium given by (Das suggested~ × H)/4πc~
by Minkowski, or by (Eas was argued the following year by Abraham.
Stated more simply, is the momentum in a dispersive medium given by pmin = nr h/λ,or pab = h/nr λ, where nr is the index of refraction of the medium, and λ is the
wavelength of the electromagnetic wave in vacuum. If one does a literature searchover the last 100 years, numerous papers are found on the subject with each form of
the momentum receiving roughly equal support (for a review see [21, 91]) until the1970’s when Peierls [90] building on the earlier work of Gordon[40], argued that both39

were incorrect, and the momentum was instead given by


1 2
h 1
2
2
p=
(1 + nr ) − (nr − 1) .
nr λ 210(3.1)

When an electromagnetic field enters a dispersive media, the frequency of thelight ν remains the same, but the wavelength of the light is modified by the index
of refraction. The wavelength in the media is given by λ′ = λ/nr , and the electromagnetic momentum carried by the photon is also modified. For momentum tobe conserved in the system, this means that the electromagnetic wave must carrymechanical momentum with it as it travels through the medium. The medium isaccelerated as the pulse enters the medium, and decelerates as the pulse exits. The
total momentum for the system is given by p = pem + pmech , however confusion arises
when one tries to properly divide the total momentum into the electromagnetic momentum pem , and the mechanical momentum pmech , carried with the wave. As asimple example of the confusion surrounding this question, if one assumes that theelectromagnetic momentum is given by the deBroglie wavelength p = h/λ, then in
the medium pem = nr h/λ = nr ~k. However, if one assumes that the fundamental
relation is given by E = mc2 , and p = E/c then one instead finds pem = h/nr λ.

3.1.1

Previous Experiments

Early experiments did little to solve the controversy, the first attempts to measure
the momentum in dispersive media were made by Jones and Richards [61], and later
updated by Jones and Leslie [60]. In their experiments, a beam of light was bounced
off of a mirror suspended in a dielectric. The results showed that the momentum
transferred to the mirror was given by 2nr ~k. Although at first glance these results
seem to agree with the Minkowski momentum, it was later shown that these results
were consistent with both the Abraham and Minkowski pictures. These results canbe simply understood by considering the standing wave created by the incident andreflected beam. The standing wave imparts momentum to the medium which remains
even after the pulse has left.
40

(b)

(a)

(c)

∆φ

∆φ

r
v

Figure 3-1: Light grating interferometer. (a) The atoms are split into two momentum
components using a light pulse. A phase shift can be applied along one of the twoarms. (b) A second pulse is applied redirecting one of the momentum components,
while leaving the other unchanged. (c) A third light pulse is applied to recombine
the components, and the interference pattern is read out.

3.2

Precision Measurements and Atom Interferometry

Recently, there have been discussions about the momentum transferred to a single
atom when it absorbs a photon, when that atoms is part of a dilute atomic cloudwith index of refraction nr . Besides answering a fundamental question about thetransmission of momenta in dielectric media, this is also an important question foratom interferometry. As was discussed in chapter 2, standing waves can be usedin atom interferometry to manipulate the state of atoms, and as shown in Fig.3-1,
a phase shift can be applied to one of the arms. As discussed in chapter 2, theoutcoupled atoms have momentum p = 2N~k, therefore a phase shift will occur justdue to the recoil momentum of the outcoupled atoms. In order to understand any
phase shift due to external sources, one must therefore first have a clear understandingof the recoil momentum transferred to the atoms.
This is of particular importance for precision measurements of h/m with ultracold
atoms. Where precise measurements of the recoil frequency are used to determine avalue for h/m, which in turn can be used to derive a value of α, the fine structure constant [112, 119, 120, 45, 6, 71]. This result combined with the value of alpha derived
41

(a)

(b)

p=??
p=??
Figure 3-2: The index of refraction in dispersive media. (a) A laser beam is incident on
a dilute atomic cloud with index of refraction nr , initially at rest. (b) An atom within
the cloud absorbs a photon. When the atom absorbs the photon what momentum istransferred to the atom, and what momentum (if any) is left in the cloud?
from the (g-2) measurements for the electron and positron [62, 66, 51] provide a testof QED. Currently the largest uncertainty in measurements of the recoil momentum,
and the resulting value for α, was due to the uncertainty of dispersive effects on thevalue for the recoil frequency [120].
What is the recoil frequency when an atom in an atomic cloud absorbs a photon?
In illustration of this question is shown in Fig. 3-2. If one assumes that no momentumis left in the medium after the photon is absorbed, then the momentum transferredto the atom should be p = ~k. One also reaches the same conclusion if one considers
a dilute gas, where the absorbing atom is isolated from the surrounding mediumby vacuum. However, if one calculates the momentum transferred to the atoms
classically using the Lorentz force applied to the atom during the absorption, youfind that momentum transferred to the atom is p = nr ~k, which would also imply
that momentum must be left in the medium after the pulse has passed [49].

42

3.3

Index of Refraction of a Dilute Atomic Cloud

When a dilute cloud of atoms is illuminated by a laser beam, the index of refraction
nr , can be found from the macroscopic polarization of the gas, P = ρhdi = χǫ0 E,
where ρ is the density of the atomic cloud, hdi is the average dipole moment of theatoms, χ is the atomic susceptibility and ǫo is the permittivity of free space. The
dipole moment for an atom within the cloud is given by hdi = ǫ0 α(EL + Eint ), where
α is the atomic polarizability, EL is the applied laser field, and Eint , the internal
electric effect due to the surrounding cloud is given by Eint = 3ǫ10 P . Combining theseequations we find1χ=ρα.
1 − ρα/3(3.2)

For a two level atom, the atomic polarizability
α=−

µ2
1
3πλ3 Γ
=,~ǫ0 Γ − i∆
Γ − i∆(3.3)

where Γ is the natural line width, and ∆ is the detuning of the laser beam. For
a dilute cloud, in the limit of ρλ3 ≪ 1 the polarizability can be approximated asχ = ρα. For 87 Rb, the situation is complicated by the hyperfine structure. In Fig. 3-3
the D2 transition hyperfine structure is shown.
For a condensate initially in the |F = 1, mF = −1i state, there are a number ofpossible excited states however, the situation can be simplified by using π-polarized
light. For π-polarized light there are only two allowed transitions, the 52 S1/2 , F =1 → 52 P3/2 , F = 1 and the 52 S1/2 , F = 1 → 52 P3/2 , F = 2 transition. The index of√refraction for the condensate, nr = 1 + χ is then given by
v
u
 3
u
λ
t
nr = 1 − 12πρ
2π

!
1 ∆2
5 ∆1
1
1
+
,
12 Γ 1 + (2 ∆Γ1 )2 4 Γ 1 + (2 ∆Γ2 )2(3.4)

where ∆1 and ∆2 are the detunings relative to the F=1 → F′ =1 and F′ =2 transitions,
respectively.
1

For dense clouds there is also a correction due to resonant Dipole-Dipole interactions [82].

43

F’=3
267 MHz

52P3/2F’=2
157 MHz72 MHz

F=2

λ=

0
78

F’=1
∆
F’=0

nm

52S1/2
6.83 GHz|1,-1〉

Figure 3-3: Hyperfine structure for the 87 Rb D2 transition. The frequency splitting
between the hyperfine energy levels is given. Starting with a condensate in the |F =1, mF = −1i state, and using π-polarized light there are only two allowed transitions.

Index of Refraction

1.4
1.2
1.0
0.8
0.6
0.4
-200

-100

0
100
∆/2π [MHz]

200

300

Figure 3-4: The index of refraction for a |1, −1i 87 Rb condensate illuminated with
π-polarized light, as a function of the laser detuning ∆. The detuning is given relative
to the 52 S1/2 , F = 1 → 52 P3/2 , F = 1 transition.

44

2nhk

0nhk

B

-2nhk
E
Release from Trap
Image in TOF

τ
600 µs
5 µs

5 µs

Figure 3-5: . Experimental setup of the two pulse light grating interferometer. The
effect of the first pulse was to outcouple a small fraction of atoms into the | ± 2~kreci
momentum state, where krec = nr k is the single photon momentum in the medium.
During the delay between pulses the phase of atoms in the| ± 2~krec i momentum
states evolve at a faster rate than those still at rest due to the recoil energy. After avariable delay time τ , a second pulse was applied recombining a portion of atoms in
the | ± 2~kreci state with those at rest in the initial condensate. The condensate wasthen released from the trap and imaged in time of flight. A typical absorption image
taken after 43ms time of flight is shown.

3.4

Experimental Setup

To measure the index of refraction of the condensate, a two pulse light grating interferometer was used, as shown in Fig. 3-5. The grating was creating using retroreflected,
near-resonant light detuned from the 52 S1/2 , F = 1 → 52 P3/2 , F = 1 transition at
780nm. The light was π-polarized both to minimize the number of allowed transitions,and also to minimize superradiant scattering [53, 100]. The laser had a linewidth γ
much smaller than Γ, the natural linewidth for the transition. The laser was aligned
perpendicular to the long axis of the condensate.
The two applied pulses were 5 µs in length, this is sufficiently short that we canassume the atoms do not move during the pulse, and therefore describe them using
Kapitza-Dirac scattering (as described in Chap.2.2.4).The first pulse outcouples afraction of atoms into the momentum states | ± 2ℓ~kreci, where the population in
45

2t
ωR
p
, krec = nr k is the single
2∆
2t
ωR
p
<1a
photon momentum in the medium, and tp is the length of the pulse. For 2∆

the ℓth momentum state is given by Pℓ = Jℓ2 (θ), θ =negligible fraction of atoms is diffracted into states with ℓ > 1, and we can restrict
our discussion to the | ± 2~kreci momentum states. Given that the initial condensate
is at rest, |ψo i = |0~kreci. Immediately after the pulse, the wavefunction is given by|ψ(tp )i = J1 (θ)| ± 2~kreci + J0 (θ)|0~krec i.

(3.5)

During the delay time τ , the phase of the | ± 2~kreci states evolves at a faster rate
than the |0~kreci state due to the recoil energy, Erec = 4~ωrec . After the delay τ , thewavefunction will have evolved as|ψ(τ )i = |ψo i J1 (θ)| ± 2~krecie∓i4ωrec τ + J0 (θ)|0~kreci .

(3.6)

At t = τ we apply a second pulse that partially recombines the momentum states.
Immediately after this second pulse the wavefunction is given by|ψ(τ + tp )i = J1 (θ)J0 (θ) e∓i4ωrec τ + 1 | ± 2~kreci+ J12 (θ) e−i4ωrec τ + ei4ωrec τ + J02 (θ) |0~kreci.

(3.7)

After applying the two pulses, the probability of finding the atoms in the |0~kreci
momentum state, ρ0 = hψ(τ + tp )|0~krec i|2 is given byρ0 = J04 (θ) + 4 J02 (θ)J12 (θ) + J14 (θ) cos(4ωrec τ ).

(3.8)

As a function of the delay time τ , the density of the recombined components will
oscillate at 4 ωrec .
In addition to the index of refraction shift, the observed recoil frequency will also
have a mean field shift [106]; the atoms in the | ± 2~krec i state have twice the mean
field energy as those at rest due to the exchange term in the interatomic potential.
Including both the mean field shift and the index of refraction, the frequency of the46

Figure 3-6: S-wave collision halos in time of flight. If the density of the condensate
was two high atoms in the | ± 2~krec i momentum peaks collided with atoms at restin the condensate during time of flight.
observed interference fringes should be:ω = 4n2r ωrec +

ρU0
,
~

(3.9)

where ρU0 = 4π~2 aρ/m, and as is the s-wave scattering length. The average density
ρ = 4/7ρo, where ρo is the peak condensate density.
As given in Eq. (3.4), the index of refraction nr is proportional to the density of
the condensate ρ. To maximize the index of refraction effects, it would seem thatusing condensates with high initial density would be beneficial. However, although
increasing the density does increase the index of refraction, using high density condensates also introduces a number of problems. Eq. (3.4) is only valid for ρλ3 ≪ 1,
if this condition is not met than additional corrections need to be made to the index
of refraction, increasing the uncertainty in the result. In addition, if the condensate
density is too high, the condensate becomes collisionally dense. As shown in Fig. 3-6,
if the density is too high, in time of flight the outcoupled atoms collide with atoms
initially at rest in the condensate creating a “halo” of scattered atoms which haveundergone s-wave collisions. The condensate density was chosen to be as high as
possible without creating appreciable s-wave collision halos in time of flight. The
optimal density was found to be ρo ≈ 2 × 1014 cm−3 , which corresponded to a total

condensate number of No = 1.5 × 106 for our trap parameters. For this condensate
density ρλ3 ≈ 0.2.

47

The intensity of the pulse was set such that ≈ 5% of the atoms were outcoupled
into the | ± 2~kreci momentum states, this not only made the analysis of the resulting
interference pattern easier by limiting the number of states, but also ensured that thecondensate density remained approximately constant throughout the measurement.
For a density of ρo ≈ 2 × 1014 cm−3 , the mean field shift to the resonance was almost
1 kHz, on the same order as the index of refraction effects. Any change in the densityof the condensate during the measurement would have potentially masked the index
of refraction effects. Due to both the density dependence of the index of refraction,and the mean field shift, it was essential to have consistent atom number from shot
to shot, for all of the data the variation in the condensate number was <10% for theduration of the experiment.

3.5

The Recoil Frequency

The recoil frequency was measured by counting the number of atoms in either the|0~kreci or the | ± 2~krec i momentum state and by then normalizing the signal to thetotal atom number, as a function of the delay time τ between pulses. Interference
fringes for a detuning of ∆ = 520Hz are shown in Fig. 3-7. In the previous section the
motion of the atoms during the delay time τ was ignored, however the amplitudes of
the recombined components will only interfere if they spatially overlap. After the first
pulse, the atoms in the |±2~kreci momentum states move within the initial condensate
with the recoil velocity (∼ 12 µm/ms). As the overlap between the recoiling atoms
and those at rest decreases, the interference fringes decay. The overlap integral forthis decay can be approximated as a Gaussian with time constant, τc ≈ 0.75 RT F /vrec ,where RT F is the Thomas-Fermi radius of the condensate, and vrec is the recoil velocity[116]. For our experimental parameters, RT F = 8µm in the radial direction giving a
coherence time of 500µs. The experiments were performed perpendicular to the longaxis of the condensate. The coherence time for the process could have been increased
by instead performing the experiments along the long axis of the condensate, however,if the pulse was applied along the long axis the probability for collisions in time of48

Fraction in 0nhk

(a)

(b)
10 µs

0.90

20 µs

30 µs

40 µs

50 µs

0.80

0.70
0

200

400

600

τ (µs)

Figure 3-7: Interference fringes for ∆ = 520Hz. (b) The atom number in the |0~kreci
momentum state as a function of the hold time τ , showing interference fringes which
oscillate at the recoil frequency. The fitted frequency was ω = 2π×156268(39) Hz andthe decay constant τc = 461(25) µs. The signal was normalized using the total atom
number in all momentum states. (a) Absorptions images for τ = 10-50µs showing thefirst period of the oscillation.The field of view is 0.5 mm × 1.5 mm
flight increased. To compensate for the increased collisions a lower density must be
used negating any advantage to this geometry. The recoil frequency was found byfitting the resulting fringes to a cosine function with a gaussian envelope: 2τA exp − 2 cos(4ωτ + φ) + C.
τc

(3.10)The expected values for A and C can be found from Eq. 3.8. The observation of
up to ten oscillations provided a precise value of the recoil frequency. The fitted
recoil frequency was found as a function of the laser detuning ∆, and the results areshown in Fig. 3-8. As the detuning was varied a shift of over 2kHz was seen acrossthe resonance, whereas the statistical uncertainty in the points was < 100Hz clearly
showing that the recoil momentum is given by |nr ~ki.
When the pulse was applied the condensate density was lowered slightly due tospontaneous scattering from the laser beam. In order to accurately calibrate thedensity of the condensate a single 5 µs pulse was first applied to the atoms. The
condensate number was then found by fitting a Thomas-Fermi profile to the integrated
optical density of the absorption image in time of flight. Although the polarization of

49

17.0

Recoil Frequency [kHz]

16.5

16.0

15.5

15.0

14.5
-1000

-500

0
500
Detuning ∆/2π [Mhz]

1000

Figure 3-8: Recoil frequency as a function of detuning ∆/2π showing the dispersive
effect of the index of refraction. The average density of the condensate for the solid
points was 1.14(4) × 1014 cm−3 , giving a mean-field shift of 880 Hz to the resonance.
The shaded area gives the expected recoil frequency including the uncertainty in thedensity. The dashed line is at ω = 4n2 ωrec + ρU0 /~, the expected value without index
of refraction effects. The data shown as open diamonds had increased spontaneouslight scattering due to σ ± light contamination in the laser beam. The increased lightscattering led to a lower initial density in the condensate, thus leading to a smaller
mean-field shift and index of refraction. The open points have been scaled upward tocorrect for this lower density.

50

960

940

920
Distance

Distance [µm]

2nhk

900

0nhk

-2nhk

880

860

-800

-400

0
Detuning [Mhz]ß red detuning (n>1)

400

800

blue detuning (n<1) àFigure 3-9: Separation between the | ± 2~kreci momentum peaks as a function of thelaser detuning ∆/2π. The separation between the peaks also shows the dispersive
effect of the index of refraction.
the beam was set to be π-polarized (and this was optimized by minimizing Rayleighsuperradiance), there was still a small amount of σ ± contamination in the pulse.
The σ ± contamination allowed ∆mF = ±1 transitions, thus for small detunings theproximity to the |1, −1i → |0′ , 0i transition located at ∆/2π = −72 MHz resulted

in higher spontaneous scattering rates, and a lower initial condensate density. Data
points taken at these small detunings were shifted upward in Fig. 3-8 to compensate
for this.
In addition to measuring the recoil frequency, one can also measure the separation
between the | ± 2~kreci momentum peaks in time of flight. Once the atoms have beenoutcoupled they move with vrec = nr ~k/m, therefore the separation should also varywith the index of refraction. The separation as a function of the detuning ∆, is shownin Fig. 3-9. The separation between the peaks also clearly showed a dispersive shape,
showing the dependence of the recoil velocity on the index of refraction.

51

3.5.1

Grating Picture

To understand the quadratic dependence of the recoil frequency on nr , we can returnto the grating picture discussed in section 2.2.1. When the light grating is incident
on a dispersive media, the grating spacing goes from λ to λ/nr . After diffracting
off of the grating the velocity imparted to the atoms is also modified by nr , withv = nr ~k/m. When the second pulse is applied, the atoms have both moved farther
by a factor of nr and the grating is smaller by a factor of nr leading to a change ofthe beat frequency on the order of n2r .

3.5.2

The Lorentz Force

The increase in the momentum transferred to the atoms can also be explained byconsidering the momentum transferred to atoms by a classical field [49]. Classically,
the force applied to an atom with dipole moment d~ during the absorption of thephoton can be found using the Lorentz force,∂ d~ ~~× B(x, t).
F~ (t) = (d~ · ▽)E(x,t) +∂t(3.11)For a plane wave with π-polarization we have:∂ d~ ~× B(x, t)
F~ (t) =∂t(3.12)

A two-level atom initially in its ground state will undergo Rabi oscillations with
ωR = µEL /~, where µ is the dipole matrix element connecting the ground |gi andexcited |ei states of the atom, and EL is the Electric field of the applied laser pulse.
At t = π/ωR the atom will have absorbed a photon, and will be in the excitedstate. The instantaneous dipole moment during this interaction is given by d ∝µ sin(ωR t) exp(iωt). The change in momentum during the interaction with the fieldthen is given by,∆p =Z π/ωRµω sin(ωR t)Bdt.

052(3.13)

Evaluating this we find ∆p = ~ω(BL/EL ). The ratio of BL /EL = n/c, giving ∆p =nr ~k. More qualitatively one can understand this by considering the integration timefor Eq. (3.13). If the index of refraction nr > 1, the Rabi frequency ωR is smaller
and the integration time will be longer, thus the change in momentum due to theabsorption of a photon in the medium will be larger than the vacuum momentum,
the converse holds for nr < 1.
However, the above derivation actually has two errors which luckily cancel eachother. In calculating the force applied to the atoms the macroscopic electric field
was used, but this is not correct. To calculate the force applied to the atom themicroscopic force at the dipole must instead be used. As discussed in the derivationof the index of refraction, in Sec. 3.3, the microscopic electric field at a dipole within
the cloud is given by Eef f = EL + Eint = EL + 3ǫ10 P . If the field is modified, then how
is the result the same? In the initial derivation of the Lorentz force another error was
made, the Lorentz force is given by
F = (d · ▽)Eef f + d˙ × Bef f(3.14)

for a nonmagnetic medium, Bef f can be replaced by BL . However, the use Eef f in
the first term results in a non-vanishing contribution. After much algebra2 , one canshow that fortuitously the term due to the gradient of Eef f in the first term cancels
out the change in the second term due to Eef f (which enters Eq. 3.13 through ωR ),and the result is still given by nr ~k.

3.6

The Recoil Momentum in Bragg Processes

If the recoil momentum is in fact nr ~k, as both the recoil frequency measurement
and the separation between the peaks show, then this means that for momentum tobe conserved, momentum must be left in the medium. Atoms which do not scatterphotons are left with momentum even after the pulse has passed, and that momentum
2

Which can be found in [90].

53can be either parallel (nr <1) or anti-parallel(nr >1) to the direction of the lightdepending on the value of the index of refraction. In the experiments described above
the atoms were outcoupled symmetrically using Kapitza-Dirac diffraction, therefore
momentum was clearly conserved and this effect was not observable. However, if
instead the length of the pulse was increased, and the lattice beams detuned toinstead use Bragg scattering, it is possible that this effect could be resolved. In Bragg
scattering atoms are only outcoupled in one direction with momentum p = |2j~kreci
for a j th order Bragg process. If a large fraction of atoms are outcoupled, for example
using a π/2 pulse, and for large values of j this effect could potentially be resolvedin time of flight. Using a π/2 pulse, the momentum left in the |0~kreci state would
be p = 2j(nr − 1)~ki. Measuring this with a condensate is complicated by two
considerations; for Bragg scattering the length of the pulse is a factor of 100 times
longer. Using near resonant light (to maximize the change in the index of refraction),
the spontaneous scattering rate can be quite high, to compensate for the longer pulse
length the detuning of the beam must be increased. This in turn decreases the index
of refraction effect. However, as an example, using a detuning of ∆ = 1 GHz, witha j th order Bragg pulse, vrec =0.05j µm/ms for the |0~kreci momentum state in timeof flight. For a 100ms time of flight this is over 5µm! But resolving this change iscomplicated by mean-field effects. For large outcoupling the position of the |0~kreci
state can also change position due to mean-field repulsion between the outcoupledatoms and those at rest making the index of refraction effects difficult to distinguish.

54

Chapter 4
Parametric Generation and
Amplification of Scattered Atom
Pairs
This chapter describes parametric generation and amplification of scattered atom
pairs, and supplements work previously reported in Ref [13], which is also included inAppendix B

4.1

Nonlinear Atom Optics

In Chapter 3, a measurement of the photon recoil momentum in dispersive media,
an important consideration for atom optics, was discussed. Another rapidly growing
field is nonlinear atom optics [73]. In nonlinear optics, since photons are noninteracting a nonlinear medium must be used to provide effective interactions. However,in nonlinear atom optics using Bose-Einstein condensates, the nonlinearity is provided by s-wave collisions within the condensate. Using condensates a number ofnonlinear processes first demonstrated with photons have been demonstrated withmatter-waves, including four-wave mixing [23, 118], solitons [24, 10, 4, 109], secondharmonic generation [122, 1, 74, 78], and sum-frequency generation [1]. One of thedriving forces behind nonlinear atom optics is to find an efficient way to create en55

SignalPump

Nonlinear
MediumIdler

Figure 4-1: Optical parametric generation of photons. A pump beam is incident on
a nonlinear medium, creating a signal and idler beams.
tangled pairs of atoms for quantum information processing. In particular four-wave
mixing has previously been suggested as a promising way to create pairs of momentum
entangled atoms [27, 93, 118].

4.2

Can a Condensate Collide with Itself ?

Another possible way to create pairs of momentum entangled beams is the matterwave analogue of Optical Parametric Generation (OPG)[94]. In optical parametric
generation of photons, as shown in Fig. 4-1, a probe laser is sent into a nonlinear
medium to create a signal and idler, where 2~ωp = ~ωS + ~ωI . Given the nonlinear
interaction in condensates, is the matter-wave equivalent to an OPG possible? In thematter-wave analogue, as shown in Fig. 4-2, two atoms in the condensate with velocity
v0 , collide to create one “red” atom with lower velocity v1 , and one “blue” atom withhigher velocity v2 . Clearly momentum can be conserved in this collision, but as
was discussed in Section 1.5, the excitation spectrum for the condensate is quadratic
for particle-like excitations. As shown in Fig. 4-2(b), for final states equally spaced
in momentum space, energy is not conserved. It would appear that the matter-wave
analogue of OPG is not possible. Four-wave mixing has been previously demonstrated
with condensates, where two atoms with initial velocity v1 and v2 scatter into final
states v3 and v4 . However, in these experiments [23, 118] using condensates in freespace, the quadratic dispersion relation for free particles only allowed for the phasematching condition to be fulfilled when the magnitudes of all four momenta were

56

(b)

v0

v1

Energy

(a)

v2
k1

k0

k2

Momentum

Figure 4-2: Can a condensate collide with itself? (a) In the matter-wave analogue
to OPG, two atoms in the condensate with initial velocity v0 collide and scatter into
final states v1 and v2 . (b) Due to the quadratic dispersion relation, it is not possible toconserve both energy and momentum in this collision. Given final momentum states
k0 , k1 , and k2 equally spaced in momentum space, the average of the final energies
clearly exceeds the initial value.
equal (in the center-of-mass frame), and the final momentum states could only be
distinguished if the experiments were performed in two dimensions.

4.2.1

Collisions in a 1D Optical Lattice

But what happens if instead a 1D optical lattice is added to the system? As discussed
in Chap.2, in a lattice the motion of the atoms is described by a band structure,
where for even shallow lattices the dispersion relation is no longer quadratic near theboundary of the first Brillouin zone. As shown in Fig. 4-3 it now becomes possible tofind pairs of quasimomentum states k0 , k1 , and k2 where both momentum and energy
can be conserved [50].
The phase matching condition for the scattering process is given by
2k0 = k1 + k2

(4.1)

2ǫ(k0 ) = ǫ(k1 ) + ǫ(k2 )(4.2)

where ǫ(ki ) is the energy of atoms in the quasimomentum state ki , determined froma band structure calculation. In the optical lattice the conserved quantity is qua57

Energy

(a)

-k L

k1
Quasimomentum

k0 k Lk2-k L k2-2kL

k1
Quasimomentum

k0 k Lk2

Energy(b)

Figure 4-3: Collisions in a 1D optical lattices. If a 1D lattice is added, the dispersion
curve is no loner quadratic near the boundary of the first Brillouin zone. It now
becomes possible to find phase matched quasimomentum states k0 , k1 and k2 where
both energy and momentum can be conserved. (a) Phase matched momentum states
are shown for a lattice depth of Vlatt = 0.5Erec . The dispersion curve is shown for
the ground and first excited band. The boundary of the first Brillouin zone is at±kL , where kL is the wavevector of the optical lattice. (b) Since the phase matched
momentum state k2 is beyond the boundary of the first Brillouin zone, the final
momentum state is mapped back into the first Brillouin zone at k2 − 2kL .

58

simomentum, and the quasimomentum is restricted to be between values of ±kL ,therefore
k2 = (2k0 − k1 ) Mod(2kL ).

(4.3)

If a one-dimensional optical lattice is added, it becomes possible to realize the matterwave analogue to OPG, and a condensate can in fact collide with itself!

4.3

Parametric Generation

To demonstrate parametric generation with atoms, the condensate must first be prepared at an initial quasimomentum k0 . To do this one has two options, one can either
create a condensate with an initial velocity v0 , or one can instead use a moving lattice.
Technically, it is much easier to create a moving lattice, so for our experiments the second option was chosen.1 As shown in Fig. 4-4, two counter-propagating laser beams
with frequency difference δν = ν2 − ν1 were used to create a moving one-dimensionallattice with velocity v = λ2 δν. The lattice was ramped onto a magnetically trapped
condensate initially at rest. In the rest frame of the lattice the condensate had quasimomentum k0 = mλ
δν. For a given value of k0 , there is only one set of states k1
2~
and k2 where the phase matching condition is met, and as the value of k0 is varied
the phase matched momentum states also vary. In Fig. 4-4(b), the phase matched
momentum states are shown for two values of k0 .
When a moving lattice was applied to the condensate, as shown in Fig. 4-4(c), as
the value of k0 was varied elastic scattering of atom pairs into final momentum states
k1 and k2 was observed. As the value of k0 was increased the final momentum states
moved closer towards the edge of the Brillouin zone, as was expected. This process isanalogous to Optical Parametric Generation, where instead of scattering two pump
photons into one red photon and one blue photon, we have instead scattered two
atoms into a higher and lower momentum state. For values of k0 below ≈ 0.55kL,
the dispersion relation imposed by the lattice did not allow for phase-matched final
1

Although as will be discussed in Chapter 6, technical issues due to vibrations can be difficult toovercome in moving lattices.

59

(a)

(c)
ν1

δν=4800 Hz

ν2

k0

Energy [Erec]

1.2
1.0

k2

0.8

k0=0.59kL

k1k0

δν=5200 Hz

k0=0.64kL

δν=5600 Hz

k0=0.69kLδν=6000 Hz

k0=0.74kL

k0

0.6
0.4

-1.0-0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0
Quasimomentum [kL](b)
k2
Energy [Erec]

1.2
1.0

k0

k1

k2

k2

0.8
k0

0.6
0.4

k1

-1.0-0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0
Quasimomentum [kL]

Figure 4-4: Parametric generation of scattered atom pairs. (a) A moving lattice
was created using two counter propagating laser beams with frequency differenceδν = ν2 − ν1 between the beams. In the rest from of the lattice the condensate has
quasimomentum k0 = mλ
δν. (b) For a given value of k0 , there is only one pair of2~states k1 and k2 where the phase matching condition is fulfilled. If k0 is varied, theallowed values for k1 and k2 change. The circles (squares) show allowed states k0 ,k1 , k2 for k0 =0.66kL (0.70kL ). As k0 is increased, the final momentum states movecloser together. The lattice depth was Vlatt =0.5Erec . (c)Absorption images showing
parametric generation. As k0 was varied, elastic scattering into final momentum
states k1 and k2 was observed. After ramping up the lattice, the atoms were held for
10 ms at a constant lattice depth. The atoms were then released from the trap andimaged after 43 ms time of flight. The field of view is 0.5 mm×0.3 mm.

60

(a)

(b)
p1

(c)

p2
δν=5250 Hz

δν=5450 Hz

δν=5450 Hz

δν=5750 Hz

kB=p1-p2k2=(2k0-k1) Mod 2kL k1

k0

Figure 4-5: Parametric amplification of scattered atom pairs. (a) First, a 2 ms Bragg
pulse was applied to the condensate. The Bragg pulse outcoupled a small fractionof atoms along the long axis of the condensate with momentum kB = (ka − kb ) in
the lab frame. The optical lattice was then adiabatically ramped on and applied for
10 ms. When the phase matching condition was fulfilled, parametric amplificationof atoms was observed in the seeded state k1 and its conjugate momentum state
k2 . (b,c) Absorption images taken for two different Bragg angles. In (b) the Bragg
wavevector was kB =0.43kL, and in (c) the Bragg wavevector was kB =0.34kL. In the
top two images, the phase matching condition was not met, and only the initial seed
and a small amount of spontaneously scattered atom pairs are visible. In the bottom
pictures k0 and k1 have been tuned to fulfill the phase matching condition by varying
the detuning δν. When the phase matching condition was fulfilled amplification of
the initial seed and its conjugate momentum state was observed.
momentum states and no scattering was observed. For values of k0 above ≈ 0.75kL,
the final momentum states were no longer distinguishable, and the condensate became
unstable.

4.4

Parametric Amplification

If the matter-wave analogue to OPG is possible, then if the process is first seeded
the matter-wave analogue of Optical Parametric Amplification (OPA) should also be
possible. To demonstrate the matter-wave analogue of an OPA, as shown in Fig. 4-5,
a small seed of atoms was first created by applying a Bragg pulse to the atoms. The
effect of the Bragg pulse was to outcouple a small fraction of atoms into the state kB .
Immediately after applying the pulse the lattice was ramped on. In the rest frame of
the lattice, the seed has quasimomentum k1 = k0 + kB . As with OPG, for a given
61

(a)

(b)

Fraction of Atoms in k2

δν=4800 Hz
0.08
0.06
δν=5200 Hz

0.04
0.02
0.00

δν=5400 Hz

-0.02
4600

5000 5400 5800
Lattice Detuning [Hz]6200
δν=5600 Hz

δν=6000 Hz

Figure 4-6: Scattering resonance for parametric amplification of atoms. (a) Resonancecurve showing amplification of k2 , when k1 was seeded. Amplification occurred only
when the phase-matching condition was met. For a fixed kB , the resonance condition
was found by varying the detuning δν of the lattice. The data was taken for kB= 0.43kL . The fraction of amplified atoms was obtained by subtracting images withand without the seed pulse. (e) Absorption images showing amplification of k1 and k2
when the phase matching condition is met. The center of the resonance was at δν ≈5450Hz, close to the calculated value of δν ≈ 5350Hz. The width of the resonance isdetermined by the Fourier width of the Bragg pulse. Most of the scattered atoms in
the third image were independent of the pulse.
value of k0 , the phase matching condition is only met for one set of states k1 , andk2 . However, to find the phase matching condition k0 and k1 could not be varied
independently; the difference k1 - k0 is set by the initial Bragg pulse. The phasematching condition was found by changing both k0 and k1 by varying the detuningδν. As shown in Fig. 4-6, when the phase matching condition was met amplificationof the seed k1 as well as its conjugate momentum k2 was observed. The growth of k1
and k2 as a function of time is shown in Fig. 4-7.
In Fig. 4-7, less than 5% of the initial condensate was outcoupled by the initial
Bragg pulse with kB = 0.43kL. The gain for the process is determined by the strengthof the nonlinear interaction, U0 between atoms in the condensate. For a shallow lattice2

U0 = 4π~m as , where as is the s-wave scattering length. From this we can estimate the
62

(b)

0.30

0.30

0.20

0.10
Atom Fraction in k1
Atom Fraction in k2

Fraction of Atoms

Fraction of Atoms

(a)

0.00

0.20

0.10
Atom Fraction in k1
Atom Fraction in k2

0.00
0

4

8
12
Hold Time (ms)

0 ms

16

0

4

8
12
Hold Time (ms)

0 ms

10 ms

16

10 ms

Figure 4-7: (a) Amplification of atoms with quasimomentum k1 (solid points), andwith conjugate momentum k2 (open points), when state k1 was seeded. (b) Amplification of atoms with quasimomentum k1 (solid points), and with the conjugate
momentum k2 (open points), when state k2 was seeded. The values for k0 ,k1 ,k2 were
0.66kL,0.23kL ,and -0.92kL respectively. The solid lines shows the expected gain using
Eq. (4.4) with variable scale factors for each curve as the only free parameters.
maximum amplification rate to be η = 2ρ0 U0 /~ [118], with Ṅ1(2) = ηN1 , where N1(2)is the number of atoms in the momentum state k1(2) . For the data shown in Fig. 4-7,
the condensate number was N0 = 1.3(3)×105. For this atom number, the maximum
growth rate should be η = 540 Hz. The amplification rate will decrease as thenumber of atoms in the initial condensate, in quasimomentum state k0 , is depleted.
However, for our small seeds, the amplification was not limited by this depletion of
the source but instead, was limited by the loss of overlap between the condensate andthe amplified pulses. The Thomas-Fermi radius (RT F ) of the condensate in the axial
direction was 33 µm, and the recoil velocity (vrec ) for the final states k1 and k2 withrespect to the initial condensate was vrec =1.8 µm/ms and 6.8µm/ms respectively.
The overlap integral between the amplified atoms and the initial condensate canbe approximated as a Gaussian with time constant τc ≈ 0.75RT F /vrec , which for ourparameters is 3.75 ms. Including this loss of overlap gives us a modified rate equation,Ṅ1,2 = ηN1 e

63

−t2
τc2

(4.4)

Since atoms are scattered into states k1 and k2 in pairs, the final atom number inthose two states (minus the initial seed) should be equal. Instead, the final atom
number in k2 was approximately a factor of 2 smaller than that in k1 . This is due theproximity of k2 to the boundary of the Brioullin zone. This leads to instabilities whereatoms are scattered into other momentum states or into higher bands. Allowing avariable scale factor to correct for this in our model, the experimental data followed
Eq. ??eq:rate).

4.5

Experimental Setup

The experiments were performed using condensates initially prepared in a magnetic
trap. The magnetic trap was cigar shaped with a radial trap frequency of 35 Hz, andan 8 Hz axial trap frequency. The condensate, containing between 0.5 − 3.0 × 105

atoms was produced in the |52 S1/2 , F = 1, mF = −1i state. The optical lattice
was created using two counter-propagating beams derived from the same laser with
λ = 1064nm, and the frequency of the two beams was controlled by two separate
acousto-optic Modulators (AOMs) driven with a frequency difference δν. The lattice
was also aligned along the long axis of the condensate, and was ramped on in 1 ms
using an exponential ramp. The Bragg pulse was created with two laser beams derived
from the same laser, which was red-detuned from the 52 S1/2 , F = 1 → 52 P3/2 , F = 1
transition at λ = 780nm by 400MHz, and was π-polarized to minimize Rayleighsuperradiance. As shown in Fig 4-5, the Bragg beams were aligned such that atoms
were outcoupled along the long axis of the condensate. The intensity of the Bragg
pulse was chosen such that less than 5% of the initial condensate was outcoupled into
the state kB , and the length of the pulse was 2ms. The angle between the Bragg
beams could be varied to change the momentum of the outcoupled atoms. After thecondensate was held in the lattice for a variable time τ it was then released from thetrap and imaged after 43 ms of ballistic expansion.
The time scales for the lattice ramp up and the Bragg pulse were both very
important. Due to the coherence length of the condensate, the time scale for the64experiment was limited to < 10ms (as can be seen from Fig. 4-7) therefore, in order tomeasure the gain it was important to ramp up the lattice as quickly as possible, whilestill maintaining adiabaticity. As shown in Fig. 2-5, as the initial quasimomentum k0
is increased this becomes more difficult. For our lattice wavelength of λ = 1064 nm,
Erec = 2 kHz setting the lower bound on the ramp time. Our 1 ms ramp time waschosen to be the fastest ramp possible while still being adiabatic with respect to k0 .
Due to the limited optical access of our machine, atoms could not be seeded
directly into k2 = -0.92kL for the growth curve shown in Fig. 4-7(b). However, due
to the proximity of k2 to the boundary of the Brillouin zone, the 1 ms ramp up was
no longer adiabatic. Because of this, if atoms were instead seeded into the state k =1.08kL, atoms from the seed were loaded into both the second Bloch band (with k =1.08kL) and the ground state (with k = -0.92kL = k2 ). As shown in Fig. 4-7(b), thegain in this case was almost identical to when the atoms were seeded in state k1 .
The 2ms length of the Bragg pulse was also limited by the coherence length of thecondensate. The width of the scattering resonance shown in Fig. 4-6 was limited by
the Fourier width of the Bragg pulse, therefore it is beneficial to make the Bragg pulse
as long as possible. However, once the Bragg pulse has been applied the outcoupledatoms recoil within the initial condensate. Since the length of the Bragg pulse wason the same order as the time scale for the amplification the pulse was applied before
the lattice was ramped on.

4.6

Dynamic Instabilities in Optical Lattices

With longer coherence times parametric amplification could be used to produce pairsof momentum entangled atoms, however first the problem of secondary collisions outof the final state k2 must be solved. Since secondary collisions were primarily causedby the proximity of k2 to the boundary of the Brillouin zone, one way of addressing
this issue is to find phase matched momentum states with k2 farther from the edge.
As shown in Fig. 4-8, this could be accomplished by increasing the lattice depth.
However, as the lattice depth is increased the phase matched momentum states also
65

1.2

Energy [Erec]

1.0
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
-1.5

-1.0

-0.5
0.0
0.5
Quasimomentum [kL]

1.0

1.5

Figure 4-8: Phase matching condition for different lattice depths. The phase matched
momentum states are shown for k0 = 0.7kL (solid points) and k0 = 0.8kL. For lattice
depths of Vlatt = 0.25Erec (solid line), 0.5Erec (dashed line), and 1 Erec (dotted line).
As the lattice depth is increased the phase-matched momentum states move closer
together.
move closer together, and this leads to dynamic instabilities.
Longer coherence times and larger gain could be created by using condensates withhigher atom number.2 However, when the experiments were performed with either
higher atom numbers, or with large values of k0 , the condensate became unstable,
and scattered into a broad band of final momentum states. For kB = 0.43kL, theenergy of atoms outcoupled by the Bragg beams was ≈ 370 Hz, whereas the chemical
potential of the condensate was ≈ 300 Hz. Because of this, if the atom number wasincreased significantly the momentum peaks were no longer distinguishable. Whenthe chemical potential of the condensate was larger than the separation between
the phase matched momentum states the process was self-seeded, i.e the momentum
spread of the initial condensate contained atoms with momentum k0 , k1 ,and k2 , andconsiderable scattering occurred. This can be seen in Fig. 4-9, where the growth iscompared for two different condensate numbers.
Similarly, if the atom number was kept constant, and the value of k0 was increased,
the phase-matched momentum states moved closer together until they too were no2

The gain is increased due to the higher density, and the coherence time is increased due to thelarger radius.

66

0 ms

2 ms

4 ms

6 ms

8 ms

10 ms

Figure 4-9: Effect of atom number on instabilities. Optical Parametric Amplificationis shown for two different atom numbers. (a) For small atom numbers the chemical
potential of the condensate was smaller than the energy of atoms outcoupled by
the Bragg pulse. The phase matched momentums states were distinguishable andatoms were only scattered into k0 , k1 and k2 . (b) For larger atom number, thechemical potential become comparable to, or larger than the separation between thephase matched momentum states. The final states were no longer distinguishable,
the process became self-seeded and atoms were scattered into a range of final states.

67

longer distinguishable. For our density, this occurred at values of k0 above ≈ 0.75kL,
and we observed a dynamic instability. If the lattice depth is increased the phasematched momentum states also move closer together. For both larger atom number,and higher lattice depth, the critical value of k0 leading to instabilities decreases. For
values of k0 less than 0.55k0 elastic scattering cannot occur, and the system should
be stable for all atom numbers. Instabilities of condensates in optical lattices has
attracted much attention recently, both theoretically [121, 103, 75, 69, 102, 125, 81,115] and experimentally [11, 14, 19, 30, 97]. Dynamic instabilities of condensates inmoving lattices were observed in Ref. [30, 97], in Ref. [97], the chemical potential wasa factor of 3 higher than in our experiment, leading to a dynamic instability for all
values of k0 above 0.55kL. Although discrete momentum states could not be observedin those experiments, it is possible that the mechanism for the dynamic instability
is self-seeded parametric amplification. Indeed, the phase-matching condition forparametric amplification is identical to the resonance condition for dynamic instability
in the noninteracting limit [121].

68

Chapter 5
The Superfluid to Mott Insulator
Transition in Ultracold Atoms
In the previous chapter, a one-dimensional optical lattice was used for nonlinear
atom optics, where the lattice was used to modify the dispersion relation. Even
though the dispersion curve was modified, the condensate was still delocalized overthe entire lattice. The condensate was still a superfluid, and could be describedwith a macroscopic wavefunction. This is only true for shallow optical lattices where
the tunneling energy is large. In this chapter, the behavior of condensates loaded
into deep optical lattices is discussed. As the lattice depth is increased, atom-atominteractions start to dominate as the tunneling rate decreases. The system undergoesa phase transition from a delocalized condensate, to a localized insulating state, froma superfluid to a Mott Insulator (MI).
This chapter starts with a simple double well model which qualitatively describes
the physics of the superfluid-to-MI transition. The double well model is then generalized to a full lattice, and the Bose-Hubbard model is derived. The phase transition forthe superfluid-Mott Insulator (MI) transition with ultracold atoms is also calculated.
Finally the effects of the external confinement on the phase transition are discussed.

69

5.1

The Double Well Model

The behavior of atoms loaded into a deep optical lattice can qualitatively be understood by first examining a double well potential. If the atoms are held in two wellswith a potential barrier between the wells, where the height of the barrier can bevaried independently, the hamiltonian for the system is given by [85]H = γ a†L aR + a†R aL + gβ/2 (a†L aL )2 + (a†R aR )2 ,(5.1)

where γ is the tunneling or hopping term between the wells, and gβ is the mean fieldenergy per atom due to the atom-atom interactions in a single well. The behaviorof this system is determined by the ratio of Ngβ/γ. When Ngβ/α << 1, the atomatom interactions are negligible. In the ground state of the system the atoms exist inan equal superposition of the left and right well given by the symmetric state |Si =√1/ 2(|Li + |Ri). For large N, the ground state of the system is a coherent state, withpmean atom number N/2 per well, and with number fluctuations σn ∼ N/2, which
are Poissonian in this case. For Ngβ/α >> 1 the atom-atom interactions dominate
the behavior of the system. The ground state of the system becomes independent
Fock states (since there is no longer a coupling term between the wells), where there
is a fixed number of atoms per site, N/2 and σn = 0. As the value of Ngβ/α is varied,
by increasing the barrier between the wells, σn decreases and number fluctuations go
to zero.

5.2

Quantum Phase Transitions

In classical phase transitions, the temperature dependent free energy of the system isminimized. The state of the system exhibits a discontinuity, which leads to a phasetransition. At zero temperature such classical phase transitions are frozen out, but
quantum fluctuations still exist due to the Heisenberg uncertainty relation, and thesystem can undergo quantum phase transitions [95]. When an external parameteris varied, a ground state with a different symmetry can appear, and the system can
70find a new ground state in a finite time due to quantum fluctuations. In contrast,classical phase transitions are driven by temperature fluctuations. An example ofa quantum phase transition is the superfluid-MI transition, which is a second order
quantum phase transition.

5.3

Bose-Hubbard Model

To model the optical lattice we generalize our double well system to the full latticesystem. Starting with the Hamiltonian given in Eq. (1.20), the external potential is
now given by V (~r) = Vext (~r) + Vlatt (~r) (where the lattice potential Vlatt is given inP
Eq. (2.22)). Expanding ψ in terms of the Wannier functions as ψ(~r) = i ai wi (~r)(theWanner functions are given in Eq. (2.27)) gives


 2
X † Z
~
2
∇ + Ulat wj (~r)
H=ai aj d~rwi (~r)
2m
hi,ji
Z
X † Z
X † †
4πas ~2
4+
ai ai ai ai
d~r|wi (~r)| +ai ai d~r|wi(~r)|2 Uext .
2m
i
i

(5.2)

This can be rewritten as the familiar Bose-Hubbard Hamiltonian[58, 32],
H = −J

where J =R

d~rwi (~r)

X †
X
1 X
ai aj + U
ni (ni − 1) +(ǫi − µ)ni ,
2
i
i

 2

R
4πa ~2

(5.3)

hi,ji

~
∇2 + Ulat2mwj (~r) is the tunneling term between nearest

d~r|wi (~r)|4 is the repulsive onsite interaction, ni = a†i ai isR
the number operator for bosons at site i, ǫi = d~r|wi (~r)|2 Uext ≈ Uext (rˆi ), is theneighbors, U =s

2menergy offset at the ith site due to the external confinement, and µ is the chemical

potential. For deep lattices, the Wannier function on a given lattice site wi (~r), canbe approximated as the ground state of the harmonic oscillator, and the numericalvalues for U and J can be easily calculated1 . For lower lattice depths, the values canbe calculated using the wavefunctions found from the single particle band structure1

see Ref. [57] for a comparison of this approximation to numerical calculations of U and J.

71

calculation shown in Chapter 2.

5.3.1

The Mott Insulator Transition

As in the double well case the kinetic energy, or tunneling term, tends to delocalize
particles over the lattice site, and minimizes phase fluctuations. The ground state of
the system is a coherent state with N atoms. This is equivalent to the behavior we’veseen in previous chapters where the condensate is a superfluid and can be describedwith a macroscopic wave function|ψSF i ∝

s
X
a†i
i

!N

|0i,

(5.4)

where s is the number of lattice sites, and the site occupation shows Poissonian number statistics. However, as the lattice depth is increased, as in the double well system
the behavior changes dramatically. As the lattice depth is increased, the tunnelingrate decreases exponentially and atom-atom interactions dominate the behavior of thesystem. The effect of the interactions is to localize atoms to individual lattice sites,
and to minimize number density fluctuations. The system undergoes a phase transition to a MI state, which can no longer be described by a macroscopic wavefunction,
but instead is described as a product of Fock statessY|ψM I i ∝(a†i )n |0i,

(5.5)

i

where n is the number of atoms in the lattice site. In the MI phase there are no
number fluctuations, the per site occupation number is completely determined andthe system has perfect number correlations.

5.3.2

Calculating the Phase Diagram

If we ignore the effect of the external potential (i.e set ǫi = µ to a constant value), thephase diagram for the Superfluid-to-MI transition can be calculated by minimizing72the ground state energy [32, 95]. To calculate the phase diagram it is easiest to firstexamine the system when J = 0, when there is no tunneling. Minimizing the onsite
energy, Hi = U2 (ni (ni − 1) − µni ), gives
2Hi= ni [ni − (1 + 2µ/U)].
U

(5.6)

The solution gives regions with different atom number per site, where the boundaryis given by the degeneracy points. The onsite energy is minimized if each site i is
occupied by exactly n atoms. For J 6= 0 one can use a mean-field parametrization
where we construct H as the sum of the single site Hamiltonians
HM F =Xi
Un(n − 1)††− ψM F a − ψM F a ,
−µn +
2

(5.7)

where ψM F is a variational parameter which describes the interaction with adjacentsites. Since the MI transition is a second order phase transition, we can expand theground state energy in terms of ψM F , the variational parameter, as E0 = E +r|ψM F |2 .
Combining the mean-field and Bose-Hubbard Hamiltonians and using second-order
perturbation theory to minimize the energy one finds an expression for r in terms ofµ/U [95]

X(µ/U)
X(µ/U)r=
1 − zJUUn(µ)n(µ) + 1+
X(µ) =
n(µ) − µ (µ + 1) − n(µ)

(5.8)
(5.9)

where n(µ) is the number of atoms per site, and z is the number of nearest neighbors
which is determined by the dimensionality of the system. For a 3D lattice z = 6. For
J = 0, the value of r changes from positive to negative at the boundary of the phasetransition where the occupation number changes by 1. Similarly, for values of J > 0,solving r = 0 gives the boundaries of the phase transition.
Fig. 5-1 shows the phase diagram as a function of µ/U, the chemical potential tothe onsite interaction. As we move towards a boundary by increasing µ, we reach

73

0.03

J/U

0.02
Superfluid
MI n=1

0.01

n=2

n=3

n=4

n=5

0.00
0

1

2

µ/U

3

4

5

Figure 5-1: Phase diagram for the superfluid-Mott insulator diagram. The phase
diagram is calculated using Eq. (5.8). As the ratio of J/U decreases, the system
undergoes a phase transition to a MI phase with fixed integer filling. If the chemical
potential µ is increased the filling factor n also increases.
a point where the addition of one atom to they system costs no energy; the kinetic
energy gained balances the interaction energy. If an atom is added to the system it
can tunnel freely, and thus will immediately condense into the superfluid state. If we
instead increase J, and approach the tip of the MI state, we reach a point where theground state changes to a superfluid to minimize energy. Contours of constant onsite
number density surround the MI lobes.
Taking the derivative of Eq. (5.8), the critical value for the phase transition canalso be found. For a 3D lattice
 

√
J
1
=
1 + 2n − 2 n2 + n .
U c 6(5.10)In Table 5.1 the critical values are given for filling factors of n = 1 to n = 5.
Although J/Erec is independent of the wavelength of light used, U is proportional toas /λL , in table 5.1, the values are given for 87 Rb and λlatt = 1064nm.

74

n

J
U c



Ulatt

1

0.0286 14.5Erec

20.0168 16.5Erec

30.0120 17.5Erec

40.0093 18.5Erec

5J

0.0076 19.5Erec

Table 5.1: Critical values for U c with different filling factors. The values are calculated using Eq. (5.10). The critical lattice depth Ulatt is given for λlatt =1064nm.

U

Figure 5-2: Excitations in the MI phase. The first excitation in the Mott insulatingphase occurs when an atom tunnels into an adjacent cell, creating a particle hole
excitation. The energy of the excitation is given by U, the onsite interaction.

5.3.3

Excitation Spectrum

After the critical lattice depth is reached, another distinctive feature of the MI phaseis the excitation spectrum. In the superfluid phase, the excitation spectrum is continuous, and takes the Bogolibov form, (see Eq. (1.26)). Whereas in the MI phase a
gap appears in the excitation spectrum. As illustrated in Fig. 5-2, the first excitedstate for the MI phase occurs when an atom tunnels into an adjacent site, creatinga particle-hole excitation. For a MI with n atoms per site, one site has n + 1 atoms,
and one site is left with n − 1 atoms. The energy of the system increases due tothe repulsive onsite interaction, and this increase in energy, due the creation of theparticle-hole excitation, is given by the onsite interaction between the atoms, U.

75

5.3.4

Effect of the External Confinement

In calculating the phase diagram above, the external confinement was set to a constantvalue. This would be correct if the experiments were performed in a box potential.
In such a potential, there is only one MI phase with integer filling factor n. If an
additional atom is added to the system the atom is able to tunnel freely, in a box
potential the addition of a single extra atom is enough to destroy the MI state.
Therefore, the realization of a MI phase in this configuration would be extremely
difficult.
In real experiments with cold atoms, the atoms are of course held in an external
harmonic trap. The effect of the external trap, and the initial density distribution of
the condensate is to instead create a shell structure. Near the edges of the trap there
is a n = 1 MI phase and as you move towards the center of the trap the occupation
number increases. As shown in Fig. 5-3, if we again take a look at the phase diagram
for the superfluid-MI transition, instead of sampling a point of this diagram we insteadsample a line. To find the occupation number for a given lattice site we can define a
local chemical potential which is equal to the chemical potential of the atoms minus
the energy offset at a given site [22]. As shown on the phase diagram, as one moves
towards the center of the trap, there are shells of increasing occupancy n, separatedby small regions of superfluidity between each MI phase. In Fig. 5-3(c) the density
distribution for a 2D slice shows this “wedding cake” structure of the MI phase.
The filling factor in a given lattice site i, can be found after defining the local
chemical potential, µi = µ − ǫi in the lattice. The global chemical potential is given
by [89, 83, 42]µ=315 (λ/2)3 m3/2 NUωtrap
√
16
2π

!2/5

,

(5.11)As shown in Fig. 5-1, the boundary between a n and n + 1 MI phase occurs when
µi /U = n. For a given external potential Uext (ri ), the radius and width of the MIphases can also be calculated.

76

(a)
0.03 MI n=1

Superfluid
0.02

J/U

n=2
n=3

n=4

0.01

n=5

0.00
0

1

2

3

µ/U

(b)

4

5

(c)

n
y
x

Figure 5-3: Effect of the external confinement on the Mott insulator transition. The
external confinement of the trap and the initial density distribution of the condensate
lead to a shell like structure, where near the edges of the trap there is a n = 1 MI
and the occupation number increases as you move towards the center of the trap.
(a) On the superfluid-MI phase diagram, instead of sampling a point on the diagram
we sample a line. The phase diagram predicts shells of MI phase separated by small
regions of superfluid in between each lobe. (b)A cartoon of a 1D slice through thelattice shows the resulting shell structure of the MI phase. (c) The density distribution
for a 2D slice through the MI phase is shown.

77

5.4

Studying Condensed Matter Physics with Ultracold Atoms

The Mott Insulator transition was originally used to describe how electron correlations can lead to insulating behavior even for partially filled conduction bands, not todescribe the behavior of neutral atoms. The superfluid-MI transition is just one example of how Hamiltonians (here the Bose-Hubbard model) which have been developed
to describe condensed matter systems could be studied using ultracold atoms.
Using ultracold atoms to study model Hamiltonians offers a number of advantageous over typical condensed matter experiments. Ultracold atoms allow for a fullrange of control over the Hamiltonians. Using the Bose-Hubbard model as an example, we can vary J by tuning the depth of the lattice, or by changing the latticespacing. U can be varied in similar ways, or by tuning the interaction using either
magnetic or optical Feshbach resonances [52, 9, 113], and in addition the dimensionality of the system can be varied from 0D to 3D by varying the number of lattice
beams used. Ultracold atoms also offer easy measurement techniques, one can either
take pictures of the atoms in trap to see the spatial distribution, or in time of flight tosee the momentum distribution. In addition, optical lattices are defect free and are
well isolated from the environment, leading to long coherence times. One difference
between ultracold atom realizations of model Hamiltonians, and condensed mattersystems is the external potential (the third term in Eq. (5.3)). However, as was discussed above, this can even be advantageous for realizing the Mott insulating phase.
A number of model Hamiltonians can be studied by using multiple atomic species
or internal states, or by varying the lattice geometry[59, 8]. In recent experiments,
in addition to the superfluid-MI transition [43, 107], the Tonks-Giradeau regime has
been explored by trapping ultracold atoms in tight 2D optical lattices [39, 87, 67, 114].
The transition to a Bose glass phase was also recently demonstrated [29]. In addition
to bosons, a number of groups are also pursuing experiments with ultracold fermionsloaded into optical lattices [16, 68], and superfluidity of ultracold fermions loaded into
optical lattices was recently demonstrated [16].
78Chapter 6
Imaging the Mott Insulator
Transition using Microwave
Spectroscopy
This chapter describes experiments performed with condensates loaded into threedimensional optical lattices, and supplements work previously reported in Ref [12],which is also included in Appendix C

6.1

Investigating the Superfluid to Mott Insulator
Transition

A number of different diagnostics have been used to characterize the superfluid toMott insulating (MI) phase transition with ultracold atoms. As discussed in chapter 5,
the MI phase is characterized by perfect number states. In our experiments the latticespacing, λ/2 ≈ 0.5 µm, is much less than our imaging resolution, since individual
lattice sites can not be resolved, it is easier to characterize the loss of phase coherence
as the system undergoes the phase transition. For low lattice depths, in the superfluid
phase, when the atoms are released from the trap and imaged after time of flight,
one sees the familiar interference pattern, the atoms are still phase coherent across

79

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

(e)

Figure 6-1: Superfluid to MI transition. Absorption images taken during the lattice
rampup at lattice depths of: (a) 5 Erec , (b) 9 Erec , (c) 12 Erec , (d) 15 Erec , and (e) 20
Erec . As the system undergoes the phase transition the interference fringes disappear.
The images were taken after 41 ms time-of-flightthe lattice. As the lattice depth is increased number fluctuations are suppressed, andphase coherence between the lattice sites is lost. In time of flight, as shown in Fig. 6-1,
as one enters the MI phase the interference peaks disappear.
The easiest diagnostic of the superfluid to MI transition is the loss of phase coherence as the lattice is ramped through the MI transition, and the restoration of phasecoherence as the lattice is ramped back down to the superfluid phase. However,this loss of phase coherence does not conclusively prove a Mott insulating state asother processes such as quantum depletion [123], or collisions during the time of flight
expansion can also lead to similar effects. A further diagnostic must therefore be performed. Previously, groups have measured the gap in the excitation spectrum in theinsulating state by either tilting the lattice potential using a magnetic gradient [43]or by using Bragg spectroscopy [108]. In addition, to characterize the MI phase, theMainz group recently used noise correlations to find correlations in the momentum
distribution of the cloud [33]. Although these diagnostics can be used to show a Mott
insulating state exists, they are not able to distinguish between sites with different
filling factor, and could not resolve the shell structure of the Mott insulating phase incold atoms. Recently, spin changing collisions [35, 34] in sites with n = 2 were selectively addressed, however this method would be difficult to use for higher occupation
numbers. In this chapter, two-photon microwave spectroscopy, and in particular thecold-collision “clock” shift is used to spectroscopically resolve, and directly image theshell structure of the MI phase in ultracold atoms.

80

6.2

Clock Shifts in Magnetically Trapped Condensates

For the past 50 years, the definition of the second has been based on microwave
transitions between hyperfine levels in Cesium atomic clocks. The accuracy of theseclocks is limited by cold collision shifts [31, 104], because of their importance in atomic
clocks, this shift is commonly referred to as the “clock” shift [38]. The clock shift
originates from the interaction between atoms in the initial and final hyperfine states.
Given an initial state |Ai and a final state |Bi, as described in previous chapters, theinteraction is provided by s-wave collisions within the condensate. If the scattering
length for the final state differs from the scattering length for the initial state, thenatoms in the final state have a different mean field energy. This leads to a shift in
the resonance frequency, and the resulting clock shift is given by [48]:∆νAB =~(aAB ρA + aBB ρB − aAA ρA − aAB ρB ) , 1
m

(6.1)

where m is the atomic mass, aAB is the scattering length between an atom in state |Ai
and an atom in state |Bi, and ρA is the density of atoms in state |Ai. In addition to
the clock shift, the resonance frequency can also be shifted by the differential Zeeman
shift between the two hyperfine levels. For 87 Rb, if one uses the states |1, −1i and|2, 1i for the initial and final states, at a magnetic bias field of B0 ∼ 3.23G the states
have the same first order Zeeman shift [48].

6.2.1

Two-Photon Microwave Spectroscopy

The bare transition frequency between the |1, −1i and |2, 1i state is ν0 = 6.834 682
610 904 29(9) GHz [7]. To transfer atoms between the two states a two-photon pulse
is used with one microwave pulse at ∼ 6.83 GHz and one RF pulse at ∼ 1.6 MHz. To
find the resonance, the frequency of the RF photon is varied. If only a small fraction
1

This equation is only true for a coherent mixture, for an incoherent mixture the shift is a factorof two larger.

81

of atoms are transferred to the final state, then Eq. (6.1) can be simplified tohρ(a12 − a11 ),πm∆ν12 =(6.2)

where for 87 Rb, the a21 and a11 scattering lengths are 5.19 nm and 5.32 nm, respectively [117].
When two-photon spectroscopy is performed on a magnetically trapped condensate (at a bias field of 3.23G), in addition to the mean field shift, the resonance isalso broadened due to the inhomogeneous density distribution of the condensate. The
broadened line shape is given by [106]I(ν) =

15h(ν − ν0 )4ρ0 ∆Es1−h(ν − ν0 )
,
ρ0 ∆E

(6.3)

where the mean field energy difference is∆E =h2(a21 − a11 ) ,
πm

(6.4)

and ρ0 is the peak condensate density. This line shape is asymmetric with the center ofthe line shape at ν = ν0 +2ρ0 ∆E/3h, and the average frequency at ν = ν0 +4ρ0 ∆E/7h.
In our experiments, another broadening mechanism was the Fourier width of thetwo-photon pulse. For a square pulse of length τ , the line shape is given by a sincfunctionI(ν) =

sin(πντ )
πν

2

.

(6.5)

This washes out the asymmetry of Eq. (6.3) and broadens the line further, although
the resulting lineshape is a convolution of the above two lineshapes, for our experiments we typically fit the spectra using a symmetric gaussian fit.
In Fig. 6-2(a), spectra are shown for a magnetically trapped condensate at two
different densities. As the density of the condensate is increased, as expected, theline is both shifted and broadened. Gaussian fits of the spectra are shown, as well as
the calculated lineshape. In Fig. 6-2(b), the center of the line is shown for increasing82

density, and in Fig. 6-2(c), the width is shown.

6.2.2

Clock Shifts in Optical Lattices

When the condensate is instead loaded into an optical lattice the density increases
as given in Eq. (5.11). If the two-photon resonance is measured for condensates held
in a combination of a magnetic and optical lattice trap, then as the lattice depth isincreased in the superfluid phase, the line should be shifted and broadened due tothe increased density of the condensate. In the MI phase, the spectra will change
considerably. For an n = 1 MI phase, since there is only one atom per site, there isno onsite interaction, and there will not be a clock shift to the resonance frequency.
In addition, the line will no longer be broadened. For MI phases with n > 1, theonsite interaction increases by U for each atom > 1, and the resonance frequency will
be shifted, but not broadened. The separation in the resonance frequency for the n
and n − 1 MI phase is given byδν =U(a21 − a11 ) /a11 .
h

(6.6)

As the lattice depth is increased from 0Erec , the line should first be shifted andbroadened due to the increased density until the MI phase transition, when discrete
peaks should appear corresponding to MI phases with different filling factors.

6.3

Experimental Setup

In previous chapters, the condensate was initially created in a Ioffe-Pritchard magnetic
trap, and then the lattice potential was either ramped or pulsed on. To prevent 3body losses during the lattice ramp it is beneficial to start with low density in theinitial condensate. This can be accomplished by either lowering the atom number,or by decreasing the initial trapping frequencies. In order to maintain good signal
to noise in the data lowering the initial trap frequencies is the better of these two
options. Due to technical limitations in our magnetic trap it was difficult to lower the
83

(a)

Atom Number [Arb]

300

|2,1

|1,-1

200

100

7860

7880

(b)

7920
7940
7960
7980
RF Frequency [F - 1950000 Hz]

8000

(c)
48

7970
7960

1/e Width [Hz]RF - 1 950 000 [Hz]

7900

7950
7940
7930

44
40
36
32
28

7920

24
0

5

10
15
20
Mean Density [1013 cm-3]

0

25

5

10
15
20
Mean Density [1013 cm-3]

25

Figure 6-2: Two-photon spectrum of a magnetically trapped condensate. (a) Atoms
in a magnetically trapped condensate are transferred from the |1, −1i to the |2, 1i
state using one microwave photon at ≈ 6.8 GHz and one RF photon at ≈ 1.6 Mhz.
The a11 and a21 scattering lengths differ by a few percent, leading to a densitydependent “clock” shift of the resonance frequency. The resonance is shown for meancondensate densities of 9 ×1013 cm−3 (circles) and 24 ×1013 cm−3 (squares), using a
20ms two-photon pulse length. As the density of the condensate is increased theresonance is shifted and broadened due to the inhomogeneous density distribution of
the condensate. The solid line shows a gaussian fit to the data, the dotted line shows
the calculated lineshape using a convolution of Eq. 6.3 and Eq. 6.5. The spectra weretaken at a magnetic bias field of ∼3.2 Gauss. (b) Transition frequency and (c) widthof two-photon resonance as a function of the mean condensate density. The solidlines in (b) gives a fit to the data. The slope of the line gives a clock shift of 1.9(1)×10−13 Hz/cm−3 . The solid line in (c) shows the calculated width of the resonance,
calculated using the clock shift found from (b). For low densities, the linewidth islimited by the Fourier width of the pulse, which for a 20ms pulse is ≈ 25Hz.

84

aspect ratio between the radial ωrad and axial ωax trap frequencies in the magnetic
trap to < 10. This meant that when the radial trap frequency was decreased toωrad ≈ 20Hz in order to decrease the density of the initial condensate, the axial trap
frequency decreased to < 2Hz. With trap frequencies this low it is extremely difficult
to ramp up the lattice potential adiabatically without causing excitations.
In order to create a low density condensate which did not have these limitations
we instead used a combined magnetic and optical trap. The magnetic trap frequencies were first lowered as much as possible, and then an optical dipole trap was added
perpendicular to weak axis of the magnetic trap increasing the axial trap frequency
ωax . The optical trap was created using a retroreflected laser beam, however thepolarization of the retroreflected beam was initially rotated to minimize the interference between the two beams. The polarization was later rotated to create a latticebeam using a liquid crystal waveplate. The intensity in the dipole trap was set suchthat when the waveplate was rotated to maximize the interference, the desired lattice
depth, Vlatt was reached. RF evaporation was used to create condensates in the combined magnetic and optical trap, however if the optical potential was to deep initially,
the evaporation became less efficient and we were not able to produce condensates.
This placed an upper limit on the lattice depths which could be achieved in the experiments. Typically, condensates with N > 1 × 106 in the |1, −1i state were created,with shot to shot number fluctuations of < 10%. To decrease the density further, afast RF sweep through the RF resonance was used to decrease the atom number toN ≈ 1 × 105 . The sweep was 5 ms long and ramped from 1.5 MHz to 3.00 MHz.
The RF power was varied from 50 to 150mVpp depending on the desired final atom
number. The trap bottom was at ≈ 2.35MHz, and varied by ± 0.05MHz from day today.
A 3D optical lattice was then adiabatically ramped onto the condensate. As
shown in Fig. 6-3, the lattice was created using three perpendicular, retroreflected
laser beams. To prevent interference between the three separate lattice beams, thefrequency of each beam was shifted by δν ≫ Γlas , where Γlas is the linewidth of thelattice laser. The polarization of each beam was set to be perpendicular to the other85

lattice depth

Figure 6-3: Three-dimensional optical lattice. The optical lattice was created withthree retro-reflected laser beams using far off resonant light at λ = 1064 nm. The
three beams were perpendicular creating a cubic lattice.

(b)
(a)
(c)
time

Figure 6-4: Lattice experimental setup. (a) The lattice was adiabatically ramped up
by increasing the intensity in two of the beams, and increasing the contrast in thethird direction. An exponential ramp with a 40 ms time constant was used. (b) While
holding in the lattice a 100 ms two-photon pulse was applied to the atoms, which if
on resonance transferred a small fraction of atoms to the |2, 1i state. (c) The atoms
were then released from the trap, and atoms transferred to |2, 1i state were imaged
after a 3 ms time of flight.
lattice beams. One of the lattice beams was created using the initial optical dipole
trap, the lattice was ramped on adiabatically by rotating the polarization of thisbeam, while increasing the intensity in the other two lattice beams. An exponential
ramp was used with a 40 ms time constant, where for a final lattice depth of 35 Erec ,the ramp up time was 200 ms. During the lattice ramp, an RF knife was kept on toremove any atoms from the trap which were heated during the ramp. As shown in
Fig. 6-4, after ramping on the lattice, a 100 ms two-photon pulse was applied. If thepulse was on resonance a small fraction of the atoms were transferred to the |2, 1i
state. The RF power was set such that on resonance, less then 20% of the atoms weretransferred to the final state. Immediately after applying the pulse the atoms were86

released from the trap and were imaged using light resonant with the F = 2 → F ′ =3 transition. The atoms were typically imaged in 3 ms time of flight to decrease theircolumn density. To image the spatial distribution the atoms were imaged in-situ.

6.4

Two-Photon Spectroscopy of the Superfluid to
MI Transition

In Fig. 6-5, two-photon spectra are shown as the lattice depth is increased. The
spectra were taken with a 100 ms pulse length, giving a Fourier limited linewidthof ≈ 5 Hz. The width of the spectra are shown in Fig. 6-6.

At 0Erec , in only

the combined magnetic and optical trap with no lattice, the linewidth of the spectra
was 8.3(6) Hz, a convolution of the mean-field broadened lineshape and the Fourier
width of the two-photon pulse. As the lattice depth was increased to 5Erec the centerof the line was shifted and the width broadened to 13(1) Hz due to the increased
density of the condensate. At 10Erec , the line was shifted and broadened further,and in addition became asymmetric as the atom number in lattice sites with small
occupation number became squeezed. Fitting the spectra as a double gaussian, thenarrower peak originating from number squeezed sites had a linewidth of only 7.5(9)Hz, reflecting the lower number variance, whereas the width of the broader peakincreased to 43(3)Hz. At 20 Erec , discrete peaks appeared corresponding to the n =1 and n = 2 MI phases, with a third broad peak corresponding to sites with larger
occupation still in a superfluid phase. The width of the n = 1 MI peaks decreased to
5.0(.7)Hz, whereas the width of the broad superfluid was 18(2)Hz, a decrease from the
10Erec width consistent with number squeezing in high occupancy sites. At 25Erec ,discrete peaks corresponding to n = 1 to n = 3 were observed, with linewidths limited
only by the bandwidth of the two-photon pulse, and no superfluid peak was observed.
At 35 Erec , peaks corresponding to n = 4 and 5 were also observed. Since there isno mean field shift, the center of the resonance frequency for the n = 1 peak should
not shift as the lattice depth is increased however, as shown in Fig. 6-5, as the lattice87

Atom number in F=2 (Arb)400

BEC in combined MT and ODT
5Erec 3D lattice
10Erec 3D lattice
20Erec 3D lattice
25Erec 3D lattice
35 Erec 3D lattice

300

200

100

7940

7980
8020
8060
RF frequency (f-1670000 Hz)

Figure 6-5: Two-photon spectroscopy of the superfluid to MI transition. Spectra for
3D lattice depths of 0Erec (open squares), 5Erec (open triangles), 10Erec (open circle),
20Erec (solid triangles), 25Erec (solid squares), and 35Erec (solid circles). The spectra
are offset for clarity. The dashed line shows gaussian fits of the peaks. As the lattice
depth is increased, the spectra are first broadened and shifted due to the increased
density. After crossing the MI transition discrete peaks appear, corresponding to MI
phase with integer filling n. The phase transition occurs at higher lattice depths forhigher values of n. As the lattice depth is increased in the MI phase, the center ofthe n = 1 peak is shifted slightly due to the differential AC stark shift of the lattice.

88

1/e width [Hz]

40
30
20
10

0

5

10

15
20
25
Lattice Depth [Erec]30

35Figure 6-6: Change in the two-photon linewidth as the lattice depth is increased. The
1/e width of each peak in the spectra shown in Fig. 6-5 are plotted. As the lattice
depth is increased from 0Erec , initially the width of the peaks increases (circles), due
to the increased superfluid density. As the lattice depth is increased further the peaks
start to narrow indicating number squeezing (squares), until finally in the MI phase,
the width is only limited by the bandwidth of the two-photon pulse (triangles). The
dashed line shows the bandwidth of the two-photon pulse.
depth was increased the center of the n = 1 peak shifted slightly to lower values2 , thisshift was due to the differential AC stark shift due to the lattice potential. In addition,
the center of the resonance could also be shifted by the admixture of particle-holepairs within the n = 1 state [37, 36]. This effect scales with J/U, and should therefore
decrease with increasing lattice depths.
The observation of discrete peaks is direct evidence for the suppression of tunnelingby interactions when the MI transition is reached. The tunneling of atoms betweensites of different occupation number during the microwave pulse would smear out thediscrete peaks and eventually lead to peaks reflecting the clock shift at an averaged
density. The characteristic energy associated with tunneling between sites is givenby the width of the first Bloch band, 4J. Therefore the tunneling time in a latticesite with n atoms, in the absence of interactions, is given by h/4Jnz, where z is thenumber of nearest neighbors (this can also be approximated using the double-wellmodel). The tunneling rates for n = 1 to n = 5 are given in Table 6.1

A verydeep lattice, where the tunneling rate was less than the length of the two-photon
2

From 8069.1(4)Hz to 8066.8(1) Hz as the lattice depth was increased from 20 to 35Erec .

89

Ulatt [Erec ]n = 1 [ms]n=2 n=3n=4 n=5

5

0.20

0.10

0.07

0.05

0.04

15

2.1

1.0

0.7

0.5

0.4

20

5.3

2.7

1.8

1.3

1.1

25

12.8

6.4

4.2

3.2

2.5

35

60

30

20

15

12

Table 6.1: Tunneling times in the optical lattice as a function of n, the occupation
numberpulse would still localize atoms even for a thermal or non-interacting gas. However
as shown in Table 6.1, even at 35Erec , all of the tunneling times, and in particular
the times for high occupation numbers, were shorter than the 100 ms two-photon
pulse. With these short tunneling times if the system were not in a MI state, theresulting spectra would be distorted, blurring out the separation between the n andn + 1 peak. In addition, for our lattice depths no discrete spectrum were observed
when the cloud was heated up during the lattice ramp by misalignment of the lattice
beams. A sample spectra taken with a slight lattice misalignment is shown in Fig 6-7.
All of our spectra were taken under conditions where the condensate fraction after
ramping down the lattice was greater than 80%.

6.5

Imaging the Shell Structure

At 35 Erec , the spectra for individual MI phases were well resolved. Therefore agiven RF frequency was on resonance with at most one MI phase, and only atoms
from an individual shell were transferred to the F = 2 state. By using resonant RF
to transfer all of the atoms in a single MI phase to the F = 2 state, and by thenimaging the atoms in trap, without time of flight, the spatial distribution of the MIphases could be directly imaged. In Fig. 6-8, in-situ absorption images which weretaken at RF frequencies corresponding to the peaks in the two-photon spectra areshown. The absorption images are integrated along the line of sight, however they
still clearly show the shell structure of the MI phase due the external confinement.
90

Atom Number in F=2 [Arb]

50
40
30
20
10
7860

7900

7940

7980

8020

RF Frequency [f-1670000 Hz]

Figure 6-7: Effect of heating on the two-photon spectra. The spectra was taken using
a lattice depth of 40 Erec , the rest of the parameters were identical to the spectra
shown in Fig.6-5. A slight misalignment of one of the lattice beams led to heating
during the lattice ramp, blurring out the discrete peaks shown in Fig. 6-5.
The n = 1 phase is shown to originate from the edge of the trap and the radius of theshells decreases until n = 5 which originates from the center of the trap. In Fig.6-8,
absorption images taken at RF values between the peaks are also shown. Although
the signal is significantly less between the resonances a small fraction of atoms arestill transferred to the F = 2 states. As discussed in Chapter 5, at non-zero values of
J/U the phase diagram predicts shells of MI phase separated by regions of superfluid.
Absorption images taken in between the resonances could be used to measure thefraction of atoms in these superfluid rings, however in order to study this the signal
to noise must first be increased by either using a longer two-photon pulse, or by using
deeper lattices to increase the separation between the MI resonances. The fractionof atoms in the superfluid rings could also be used to probe the temperature of thesystem [22].
In Fig. 6-8, the calculated radius for the MI shells is also shown, the value
for the radius of the nth MI phase was calculated using the condition n − 1 <µ − m2 ωr2 r 2 /U < n. As discussed in the next section, the measured values of U
extracted from the spectra were used to calculate the radius. With the exception of
the n = 1 peak, the observed radii were in good agreement with the calculated values.
91

Atom Number in F=2 [Arb]

(a)

(1)
60

40

(2)
20

(5)

7940

(b)

(3)

(4)
(iv)

(iii)

(i)

(ii)

7980
8020
RF Frequency [f-1670000 Hz]

(1)

(i)

(2)

(ii)

(3)

(iii)

(4)

(iv)

(5)

8060

Figure 6-8: Imaging the shell structure. (a) Two-photon spectra at 35Erec .
(b)Absorption images for decreasing RF frequencies. To image the spatial structure of the MI phase the absorption images were taken in trap with no time-of-flight.
Images 1 to 5 show the shell structure for the n = 1 to 5 MI phase shown in (a).
Images taken in between the peaks (i to iv) show a much smaller signal. With better
resolution images in between the peaks could be used to determine the extent of thesuperfluid shells. The field of view was 185 µm by 80 µm

92The disagreement with the n = 1 peak was most likely due to anharmonicities in theexternal trap caused by the overlap between the combined magnetic and optical dipole trap. This has since been remedied by increasing the waist of the initial optical
dipole trap leading to a more spherical trap.

6.6

Onsite Interaction

As mentioned briefly in the previous section, we can also extract a measurement ofU, the onsite interaction from the spectra. As shown in Fig. 6-9, as the lattice depth
is increased within the MI phase, the separation between the n and n + 1 peaks
increased. The separation between the peaks, as given in Eq. 6.6, is dependent on
only the scattering lengths and the onsite interaction U. Therefore, the increase in
the separation of the peaks as the lattice depth is increased gives us a direct measureof the onsite interaction. In Fig. 6-9(b), the separation between the n = 1 and n =2 peak is compared to the calculated values using a band theory calculation. The
uncertainty in the calculated values is due to the uncertainty in the a12 scattering
length, and the uncertainty in the measured points is due to the uncertainty in thelattice calibration. Including these uncertainties, the measured values for the onsite
interaction were in good agreement with the expected values.
From a close examination of the two spectra shown in Fig. 6-9, one may notice that
although the separation between the n = 1,2, and 3 peaks seems to be approximately
constant, the n = 3,4 and 5 peaks appear to be closer together. As shown in Fig. 69(c), if one plots out the separation between the peaks relative to the n = 1 peak,they are in fact closer. At 35Erec , the separation between the n = 1 and n = 2
peak is 30(1) Hz, whereas the separation between the n = 4 and n = 5 peak is
only 22(2) Hz, a 25(7)% decrease from the expected onsite interaction! For deep
lattices, the wavefunction on an individual lattice site can typically be approximatedas the ground state of the harmonic oscillator, however this deviation shows thatfor high filling factors this is no longer a good approximation. As the filling factor
in a given lattice site is increased, the repulsive interactions also increase, causing
93

(a)

Atom Number [Arb]

120
100
80
60
40
20

7940

7980 8000 8020 8040 8060
RF Frequency [f-1670000 Hz]

8080

(c)
0

0

Location of Peaks [Hz]U/h x ∆a/a11 [Hz]

(b)

7960

-10
-20
-30
-40

-40
-80

-120

0

10

20
30
40
Lattice Depth [Erec]

50

1

2

3
4
5
Occupation Number nFigure 6-9: Measuring the onsite interaction. (a) Two-photon spectra for lattice
depths of 25 Erec (squares) and 35 Erec (circles) as the lattice depth was increased.
The separation between the n and n + 1 resonance increased due to the increased
onsite interaction, and the separation between the peaks gives a direct measurementof the onsite interaction. The spectra are offset for clarity. (b) The separation between
the n = 1 and n = 2 peaks for the two spectra shown in (a) are plotted. The separation
increased from 22(1)Hz to 30(1)Hz between 25 Erec and 35 Erec . The shaded line area
gives the expected value for the onsite interaction including the uncertainty in thea11 and a12 scattering lengths. (b) The separation for the n = 1 to n = 5 resonances
are shown relative to the position of the n = 1 peak. For low occupation numbers
the separation was approximately constant, implying a constant U. However for
higher occupation the peaks moved closer together showing a decrease in the onsite
interaction for higher n. The line is a fit to the separation between the n = 1 and n= 2 peak.

94

the wavefunction to “bulge” out slightly, lowering the onsite interaction. Our spectra
allow for both a measurement of the onsite interaction, and also allows us to infer how
the wavefunction changes for higher filling factors. Using a variational calculation,
similar to that shown in Chapter 1.4.1, one can find the change in the harmonic
oscillator length due to the increased repulsive interactions. The variation calculation
for n = 5 predicts a 7% increase in the harmonic oscillator length, leading to an 18%
decrease in the onsite interaction, in agreement with our measured value.

6.7

Lifetime of the Shells

In the superfluid phase, the lifetime of the condensate is limited by 3-body recombination. As the lattice is ramped on, as was shown by the two-photon spectra, thecondensate density increases dramatically. In order to decrease 3-body related heating during the lattice ramp up, the initial condensate density must be kept as low as
possible. Once in the MI phase the lifetime is highly dependent on the filling factor ina given MI shell. By adding a hold time into the experimental sequence after ramping
up the lattice, but before applying the two-photon pulse, the lifetime of individual
MI phases could be measured.
In Fig. 6-10, two-photon spectra are shown for increasing hold times. For the n =1 MI phase, since collisions cannot occur, (and ignoring technical noise) the lifetimeof the atoms should be limited only by spontaneous scattering from the lattice. The
spontaneous scattering rate from the lattice potential using Eq. (2.16)is only ΓSC ≈.005Hz for a 35 Erec lattice. For the n = 2 MI phase 2-body processes are allowed,
however for 87 Rb the dipolar relaxation rate is quite small, with ΓDP < 10−2 Hz. For
sites with n >3, 3-body recombination again becomes the limiting factor. For the MIphase the 3-body rate is given by Γ3B = γn(n − 1)(n − 2)[56]. For our parameters,R
γ = K123 d~r|wi (~r)|6 = 0.026 Hz, where the Wannier function has been approximatedas the ground state of the harmonic oscillator. Using this value, the scattering rate
for the MI phases are Γ3B = 0.16 Hz, 0.63 Hz and 1.58 Hz for the n = 3, 4 and 5 MIphase. If we adjust the rate of γ using our variational calculation for the harmonic95

Atom Number in F=2 [Arb]

100
80
60
40
20

7940

7960

7980 8000 8020 8040
RF Frequency [f-1670000 Hz]

8060

8080

Figure 6-10: Lifetime of the shells. By adding a hold time before applying the twophoton pulse the lifetime of individual MI phases could be measured. Holds of 0
ms (solid circles), 100 ms (solid squares), 400 ms (open circles) and 2000 ms (opensquares) are shown. The lattice depth was 35Erec except for the 100 ms hold time forwhich it was 34Erec . The spectra were offset for clarity.

96

oscillator length for the n = 5 MI phase we find a rate of Γ3B = 1.05 Hz. Our
measured lifetimes derived from Fig 6-10, were τ ≈ 1s, 0.5s and 0.2s for the n = 3,4
and 5 MI phases. The disagreement between our measured lifetimes and the 3-bodyrate was most likely due to technical noise in the lattices. For n = 1 and 2 lifetimesof over 5 s were observed.

6.8

Lattice Design and Alignment

In the following section I describe the design of the optical lattice setup, and detailsome of the technical difficulties that arose during the lattice experiments. The section
is primarily meant as a resource for future lab members.

6.8.1

Lattice Setup

The lattice experiments were all preformed in the main “production chamber” where
the optical access is severely limited by both MOT optics and by imaging optics.
To couple the IR lattice light into these beam paths dichroic mirrors3 , which reflect
1064 nm light and transmit 780 nm light, were used for both the input of the latticebeam and for the retro reflection. Using dichroic mirrors is non-optimal for multiple
reasons. For the lattice light (at 1064 nm), a few percent of the beam is transmitted
instead of being reflected. For the mirrors before the chamber this has no effect,
however for the retroreflected beam this means that the lattice contrast is not 100%.
Reflections from the back surface of dichroic can also cause problems. For the 780
nm light <90% of the light is transmitted, leading to unbalanced MOT beams andalso imaging problems. However, given our limited optical access the lattice beams
had to be aligned on top of 780 nm beams.
The lattice laser was a 20W single frequency Ytterbium fiber laser, purchasedfrom IPG Photonics, a single laser was used for all three lattice beams. The laser
was split into three beam paths and then transferred from the optics table to the3

The mirrors used at 45◦ incidence were short wave pass dichroic beamsplitters, the 0◦ incidence
mirrors were Nd:YAG mirrors which only reflected 1064 nm light and act as a window for 780 nm
light.

97

Imaging/MO
L1

L2

L3
dichroic mirror

pinholephotodiodewaveplates
BEC
PBSC

chamberfiber

L4

Figure 6-11: Lattice setup. The lattice light is brought to the table using a high power
optical fiber (see text for description). Immediately after the fiber a polarizing beam
splitting cube (PBSC) is used to clean up the polarization of the light. A pick-off
window is then used to send a few percent of the light to a photodiode which is used tostabilize the intensity of the beam. After the pick off, both a λ/4 and a λ/2 waveplate
are used to set the polarization of the beam. The beam is then expanded using atelescope, and is focused on the condensate using an achromatic lens. The beam is
re-collimated after exiting the chamber and is then retro-reflected. Three irises areused to block back reflections from lenses and the vacuum chamber viewports.
experiment table using high power single mode optical fibers made from components
also purchased from IPG Photonics. A detailed description of how to make and alignlight through these fibers is given in [124]. A generalized schematic and description
for the lattice setup is shown in Fig. 6-11. The liquid crystal waveplate used tocontrol the polarization of the optical dipole trap used in the combined magnetic andoptical trap was purchased from Meadowlark optics (LRC-100 IR2 1” with attachedcompensator), and was placed immediately after the chamber before the final lensand mirror. The waveplate requires a 2 kHz square wave, and the retardation isdetermined by the amplitude of the square wave. The response time of the waveplate
was between 10 - 50ms for a λ/4 rotation which was sufficient for our experiments4 .
4

A λ/4 retardation rotates the beam by λ/2 since the beam is transmitted through the waveplate
twice, once after exiting the chamber, and once after retroreflection before reentering the chamber.

98

The lattice lifetime and the quality of the Mott insulating state were highly sensitive
to slight misalignments in the lattice beams. In the following section the alignment
procedure for the lattice is detailed.

6.8.2

Lattice Alignment

To align the optical lattice, the BEC was first imaged along the lattice direction bytransmitting imaging light through the lattice beam path. The dichroic mirror used
for the retroreflection was removed to ensure that the imaging beam was not displaced
relative to the lattice beam. The BEC was focused onto the imaging CCD camera(an additional lens was added just before the camera to focus the image) by moving
the second achromatic lens (the lens used to re-collimate the lattice beam before thefinal mirror). The pixel position of the focused condensate was then marked on thecamera, and the lattice beam was aligned and focused onto the same spot. To focus
the lattice beam onto the camera the first achromatic lens was moved. To fine tune
the alignment, the laser power was turned up to its maximum value (∼3W), and a
BEC was created in the combined magnetic and optical trap (with the initial beam,
but no retro-reflected beam). The final lattice mirror before the chamber was thenaligned such that the position of the BEC in the combined trap was identical to theposition in just the magnetic trap. The position was checked along both directions
perpendicular to the lattice. This process was repeated for all three lattice beams.
After aligning the initial beam, the retro-reflected beam was roughly aligned byreflecting the beam back onto itself, and then by maximizing the power coupled backthrough the fiber coupling onto the optics table. The alignment was then fine tuned
using Kapitza-Dirac(KD) diffraction. To align the beam using KD, the lattice waspulsed on for 12.5 µs. The retro-reflecting mirror was then aligned to maximize thediffraction pattern. After alignment, the lattice depth was calibrated by measuring
the population in each KD order as a function of the laser intensity as discussed in
section 2.2.4.

99

6.8.3

Technical Issues

To ensure good stability and lifetime in the lattice there are a few essential points:
1. Proper alignment of the beams. Even slight misalignments of the lattice caused
substantial center-of-mass oscillations when the lattice was ramped onto the condensate. Although this does not severely affect the lifetime in a 1D lattice, when a 3D
lattice was ramped on these oscillations led to considerable heating of the cloud.
2. Back reflections. If back reflected beams were aligned onto the atoms this decreased the lifetime of the lattice significantly. The majority of viewports in our main
“production” chamber are not IR coated, in particular, the “penny window” viewports which are parallel to the long axis of the magnetic trap reflect a non negligible
amount of light.5 To limit the effect of back reflections, as shown in Fig. 6-11 irises
were placed as close as possible on either side of the chamber. An additional problem
from back reflections was on the intensity stabilization. If back reflections were notblocked they formed an interference pattern on the photodiode used to stabilize theintensity of the beam (see Fig. 6-11). The feedback then stabilized the interference
signal between the initial and retroreflected beam leading to intensity fluctuations on
the atoms. These intensity fluctuations led to heating in the lattice and shortened
lifetimes. To minimize this problem, if polished fibers are used, it is essential to use
angle polished fibers to avoid near normal reflections off the face of the fiber.
3. Vibrations. Although the retro-reflected lattice is less sensitive to vibrations
then the moving lattice described in chapter 4, we have still seen vibrations effectthe lifetime of the lattice. In particular, our original CCD camera was air cooled andvibrations from the fan caused significant problems. Suspending the camera fromthe table increased the lattice lifetime for the retroreflected lattice by approximately
a factor of 2, and for the moving lattice by more than an order of magnitude. We
have since switched to a water cooled camera which seems to have alleviated these
problems. However, due to our lack of optical access, all of our lattice beam paths
are quite long. The longest being over 3 m, making vibration isolation difficult. For
5

We once mistakenly aligned only the back reflection from the penny windows onto the condensate
and saw considerable Kapitza-Dirac diffraction.

100

moving lattices vibrations pose an additional problem, since the lattice is sensitive toany element in the beam path vibrating, not just the retroreflection mirror.
4. Polarization. Besides back reflections, the “penny window” viewports arealso birefringent. Because of this, the lattice in this direction is very sensitive tothe polarization of the light. In order to maximize the contrast of the lattice, thepolarization must be linear.
In the future, first transporting the atoms to an auxiliary chamber, with better
optical access, coated windows, and with shorter beam paths allowing for better
vibration isolation should make aligning and creating stable lattices a much easier
task.

101

Chapter 7
Raman Amplification of Matter
Waves
This chapter briefly introduces Raman superradiance, which was previously describedin [99], and is also included in Appendix D

The first research that I made a major contribution to after arriving at MIT was
the demonstration of a “Raman Amplifier” for matter waves. Since the majority ofthis thesis has been focused on the use of optical lattices to manipulate ultracold
atoms, I only briefly introduce the experiment here, and refer the interested reader
to appendix D for a more detailed description. The Raman superradiance project
gives an excellent example as to how “mistakes” in the lab can sometimes lead tonew physics.

7.1

Rayleigh SuperradianceI start this chapter with a very simple question, what happens when you illuminate a
Bose-Einstein condensate with a single off resonant laser beam? Normally of course,
you would expect to just see normal Rayleigh scattering, where an atom absorbs aphoton and spontaneously emits a photon. The result is a dipolar emission pattern.
However, as was shown in [54], if an elongated condensate is illuminated with an102

off resonant laser beam, and if the beam is perpendicular to the long axis of thecondensate, instead one sees highly direction scattering into discrete momentum states[Fig. 7-1(b)]. This phenomena of supperradiant scattering was first proposed by Dicke[26], where he showed that spontaneous emission from an ensemble of N localized
atoms in a cooperative state is enhanced by a factor of N over the single atomemission rate.
To understand Rayleigh superradiance one can consider the grating formed by therecoiling and stationary atoms. Initially, when the laser beam is first incident on thecondensate the first atom can scatter a photon in any direction. Once the atom has
scattered a photon it will then recoil within the condensate due to the recoil velocity.
The recoiling atoms are still in the ground state, therefore the recoiling atoms andthose at rest can still interfere, creating a moving density grating, which can thendiffract subsequent photons. This process is self-amplifying, since each diffracted
photon creates a recoiling atom, which in turn increases the amplitude of the matterwave grating. If the condensate is elongated, the gain will be largest when the photons
are scattered along into the long axis of the condensate, this is the so called “end-fire”
mode. Alternatively, one can also think of the probe beam and end-fire mode as anintensity grating, or a moving optical lattice.
In early 2002, the first experiments performed on the newly built “Rubidium”
machine at MIT were on Rayleigh superradiance in the short and long pulse regime[101]. In the short pulse (Kaptiza-Dirac) regime atoms were scattered both parallel
and anti-parallel to the direction of the incoming beam, and in the long pulse (Bragg)
regime only parallel to the beam.

7.2

Raman Superradiance

Rayleigh superradiance is highly depend on the polarization of the incident laser
beam. In Rayleigh superradiance, the initial and final state of the atom are the same.
The absorbed and emitted photons have the same polarization, and in order to see
superradiance we must have emission into the end-fire mode. As shown in Fig. 7-1,
103

(a)

(b)
pol.

(c)
pol.

(d)
pol.

(e)
pol.

Figure 7-1: Transition from Rayleigh to Raman superradiance. (a) A elongatedcondensate is illuminated with a single pump beam. The condensate is then released
from the trap and imaged after 30 ms time of flight. The field of view is 1.3 mm×1.4
mm. (b) When the pump beam was π-polarized with the electric-field vector E
perpendicular to the long axis of the condensate supperradiant Rayleigh scattering
was observed. (c) When the polarization of the beam was instead parallel to the longaxis of the condensate the supperadiance was suppressed, and a “halo” pattern fromnormal rayleigh scattering was observed. In (b,c) the pulse length was 1 ms, with 40µW of power. In (d,e) the pulse length was both shortened and the intensity increased
by a factor of 100. (d) For E perpendicular to the long axis, self-stimulated KapitzaDirac scattering was observed. (e) For E parallel, superradiant Raman scattering wasobserved. The pump beam detuning was ∆ = -340MHz for all of the images. The
detuning is given relative to the 52 S1/2 , F = 1 → 52 P3/2 , F = 1 transition.
this requirement is fulfilled by using π-polarized light, where the polarization of theelectric field vector E is perpendicular to the long axis of the condensate. However, if
you rotate the polarization such that E is parallel to the long axis of the condensate
then emission into the end-fire mode is suppressed. As shown in Fig. 7-1(c), instead ofseeing superradiant scattering one instead sees the dipole emission pattern of normal
rayleigh scattering.
One night in early 2002, while finishing up the Rayleigh superradiance experiment,a very strange signal was seen. Instead of a cascade of superradiant states, as seen in
Fig. 7-1(b), the condensate was instead depleted into just one order. After checking
a variety of parameters it was realized that the polarization of the beam wasn’t quite
right. The polarization was fixed, and the problem was solved. However, we always
wondered what had caused those strange pictures. A year later we returned to the
problem and decided to try to reproduce the pictures. The results are shown in 7-1(e).
With E polarized parallel to the long axis of the condensate, where superradianceshould be suppressed, instead when the pulse length was shortened and the intensity
104

(a)

(b)

1 µs

2µs

10µs

3µs

50µs

500µs

Figure 7-2: Time Evolution of Raman superradiance. Absorption images taken forincreasing pulse length. The detuning of the beam was ∆ = -340MHz. The pulse had
2.2mW of power. As the pulse length was increased the atoms were scattered into
two discrete states. The initial condensate was in the |1, −1i state and the final peaks
were in the |2, −2i state. In (a) Absorption images are taken after first repumping
the F = 1 atoms into the F = 2 state and by then imaging with light resonant with
the F = 2 state. (b) Absorption images of only the F = 2 atoms.
increased, supperadiant peaks appeared. But how could this be? In Fig. 7-3, atime evolution of the process is shown. When the power in the pulse was increased
by a factor of 100 from those used in the Rayleigh supperradiance experiments, thescattering became highly directional again and two distinct peaks appeared into which
the entire condensate was transferred. Unlike the normal cascade pattern seen inRayleigh supperadience due to higher order scattering events, the atoms remained inthese two peaks, even when the light was left on.
The condensates used in these experiments were initially created in the |F =1, mF = −1i state. Imaging the atoms using light only resonant with atoms in the F= 2 state, and applying a magnetic field gradient during the time of flight to perform aStern-Gerlach separation, we discovered that the atoms in the two final peaks were nolonger in the |1, −1i state. They had instead been transferred to the |2, −2i state, we
had demonstrated Raman superradiance. The atoms absorbed a π-polarized photon
from the laser beam, and emitted a σ-polarized photon into the end-fire mode. For
the detuning of our probe beam, ∆ = -340MHz, the |2, −2i state this was the mostprobable transition. Once the atoms had scattered a photon and were in the |2, −2i
105

(a)

(b)
k

q

k-q

∆
endfire
pump
beam
pulse
σ+/− pol
π pol
F=2
}
6.8
GHz
F=1

Figure 7-3: Experimental setup for raman superradiance(a) An atom absorbs a photon with momentum k. The atom then emits a photon with momentum k − q into
the end fire mode of the condensate, and recoils with momentum q. (b) The absorbed
photon has π-polarization, and the emitted photon σ±-polarization leading to a Raman transition to a different hyperfine state. The final state was ≈ 6.8GHz detuned
from the pump beam.
state, as shown in Fig. 7-3, they were 6.8 GHz out of resonance with the probe beamand no higher order scattering events could occur. By varying the detuning of theprobe beam, the final states could also be varied. The fraction of atoms transferred
to a given state could be calculated from the two-photon transition matrix for a given
detuning. In Fig. 7-4, the results are shown for a detuning of ∆ = -140 MHz, whereatoms were scattered into |1, 0i, |1, −1i, as well as the |2, −2i state.
In addition, this process was used to demonstrate a matter wave amplifier where
the initial and final states are different. It is really quite amazing the number ofdifferent phenomena which can be seen by simply shining a single laser beam onto a
condensate. This project also showed how simple “mistakes”, here a wrong polarization, can led to unexpected results.

106

(a)

(b)

Increasing B

(c)

(d)

2,−2

1,1

1,0

1,−1

2,−1

2,0

2,1

2,2

Figure 7-4: Hyperfine state identification of Raman supperradiance. (a) Absorption
image showing superradiant Raman scattering. The pump beam had a detuning of∆ = -140MHz. The pulse was 5 µs, with 0.9 mW of power. (b-d) Absorption images
taken using a magnetic field gradient to separate the hyperfine states. (b)The initialcondensate in the |1, −1i hyperfine state. (c,d) After applying the laser pulse theatoms were scattered into two superradiant orders. (c) Absorption image showing
both F=1 and F=2 atoms. (d) Absorption image showing only F=2 atoms. The firstorder peaks had atoms in the final states |2, −2i and |1, 0i. Atoms in the |1, 0i state
were still near-resonant with the pump beam and scattered atoms into the second
order peak which was in state |1, 1i. The field of view was 4.6 mm × 0.2 mm

107

Chapter 8
Conclusion and Outlook
The unifying theme of this thesis has been the use of optical lattices to manipulate
Bose-Einstein condensates. However, in each experiment the lattice has been used invery different ways and to study very different physics.
Precision Measurements and Atom Interferometry - A pulsed optical lattice wasused to measure the photon recoil momentum in dispersive media. Not only did
this answer a fundamental question about momentum in dielectric media, but it will
also hopefully improve the accuracy of precision measurements made using ultracold
atoms.
Nonlinear Atom Optics - A shallow one-dimensional optical lattice was used tomodify the dispersion relation for the condensate in order to demonstrate the matterwave analogue of both optical parametric generation and amplification of photons.
Strongly Interacting Systems - A deep three-dimensional optical lattice was used
to demonstrate the superfluid-to-Mott insulator transition. Two photon microwave
spectroscopy was then used to resolve and directly image the shell structure of theMI phase.

8.1

The Future of BEC IV

The superfluid to MI transition with ultracold atoms, is just one example of how
ultracold atoms can be used to simulate more complicated condensed matter systems
108([8], and references therein). As we start to study more complicated systems, the microwave spectroscopy detailed in this thesis should prove to be an excellent diagnostic.
In future experiments with the MI transition one could precisely measure the number
statistics as the system undergoes the phase transition. Although at low lattice depths
the tunneling rate is still high, the lattice depth can be suddenly increased, freezingin the population [44], which can then be probed using high-resolution microwave
spectroscopy. In addition, by applying a magnetic gradient across the lattice, tomographic slices could be selected, combining full 3D resolution with spectral resolutionof the site occupancy.
The addressability of individual shells described here could be used to create
systems with only selected occupation numbers (e.g., by removing atoms in othershells). Such a preparation could be important for the implementation of quantum
gates, for which homogenous filling is desirable. The ability to address sites with unit
occupancy can also be used to make improved precision measurements [28].
In the near future, our optical lattice experiments will move from being preformedin the main “production” chamber, to the auxiliary “science” chamber. The improved
optical access and vibration isolation of the science chamber should lead to betterstability and longer lifetimes in the optical lattice, and in general should make theexperiments much easier to setup and perform. New lattice geometries, such as
triangular lattices, spin-mixtures, and disordered potentials will all be possible torealize in the new science chamber, leading to almost endless possibilities. I am
leaving the Rubidium lab in very capable hands, and look forward to hearing of their
future successes, of which I’m sure there will be many.

109

Appendix A
Photon Recoil Momentum in
Dispersive MediaThis appendix contains a reprint of Ref. [63]: G.K. Campbell, A.E. Leanhardt, J.M.
Mun, M. Boyd, E.W. Streed,W. Ketterle, and D.E. Pritchard, Photon Recoil in Dispersive Media, Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 170403 (2005).

110Appendix B
Parametric Amplification
This appendix contains a reprint of Ref. [13]: G.K. Campbell, J.M. Mun, M. Boyd,
E.W. Streed,W. Ketterle, and D.E. Pritchard, Parametric Amplification of Scattered
Atom Pairs, Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 020406 (2006).

115

PRL 96, 020406 (2006)

PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS

week ending
20 JANUARY 2006

Parametric Amplification of Scattered Atom Pairs
Gretchen K. Campbell, Jongchul Mun, Micah Boyd, Erik W. Streed, Wolfgang Ketterle, and David E. Pritchard*
MIT-Harvard Center for Ultracold Atoms, Research Laboratory of Electronics and Department of Physics,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA(Received 12 September 2005; published 19 January 2006)
We have observed parametric generation and amplification of ultracold atom pairs. A 87 Rb BoseEinstein condensate was loaded into a one-dimensional optical lattice with quasimomentum k0 and
spontaneously scattered into two final states with quasimomenta k1 and k2 . Furthermore, when a seed of
atoms was first created with quasimomentum k1 we observed parametric amplification of scattered atoms
pairs in states k1 and k2 when the phase-matching condition was fulfilled. This process is analogous to
optical parametric generation and amplification of photons and could be used to efficiently create
entangled pairs of atoms. Furthermore, these results explain the dynamic instability of condensates inmoving lattices observed in recent experiments.
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.96.020406

PACS numbers: 03.75.Kk, 03.75.Lm, 05.45.aNonlinear atom optics is a novel research area born withthe advent of Bose-Einstein condensates of alkali atoms[1]. Unlike photons, ultracold atoms have a very strong
nonlinearity directly provided by s-wave collisions, andtherefore they do not need a nonlinear medium to provide
effective interaction. A number of nonlinear processes firstobserved with photons have been demonstrated with matterwaves such as four-wave mixing [2,3], solitons [4 –7],
second-harmonic generation [8–11], and sum-frequency
generation [9]. Nonlinear atom optics, and, in particular,
four-wave mixing, has previously been suggested as an
ideal way to create entangled pairs of atoms [3,12,13].
However, in previous four-wave mixing experiments[2,3] using condensates in free space, the quadratic dispersion relation for free particles only allowed for the phasematching condition to be fulfilled when the magnitudes of
all four momenta were equal (in the center-of-mass frame).
This is the only way in which two particles can scatter off
each other and conserve energy and momentum. In particular, in free space, if a condensate is moving with
momentum k0 , atoms within the condensate cannot elastically scatter into different momentum states, and therefore
the analog to optical parametric generation of photons is
not possible.
The situation is very different when an optical lattice isadded. The lattice delivers energy in the form of the ac
Stark effect and momentum in units of 2@kL to the atoms,
where kL is the wave vector of the optical lattice. The
motion of atoms in this periodic potential is described bya band structure, which deviates from the quadratic freeparticle dispersion curve. In a lattice, as recently suggested[14], it becomes possible for two atoms in the condensate
to collide and scatter into a higher and lower quasimomentum state and conserve energy. As we discuss below, thiscan lead to dynamic instabilities of the condensate, but alsoenables nondegenerate four-wave mixing and the atomoptics analog of optical parametric generation.
Phase matching is essential for high efficiency in nonlinear processes in quantum optics including optical para0031-9007=06=96(2)=020406(4)$23.00

metric generation of photons [15], and a modification of
the dispersion curve has been used to demonstrate opticalparametric amplification in semiconductor microcavities[16]. In atom optics, dispersion management was used tomodify the effective mass of atoms [17], and to create
bright gap solitons [18]. Here we demonstrate that bymodifying the dispersion curve using an optical lattice,scattering processes which cannot occur in free spacebecome possible, and we realize the matter-wave analogueof an optical parametric generator (OPG) and an opticalparametric amplifier (OPA).
To demonstrate the matter-wave analogue of an OPG, a
87
Rb Bose-Einstein condensate with quasimomentum k0
was loaded into a one-dimensional optical lattice. To load
the atoms at a given quasimomentum relative to theBrillouin zone, a moving optical lattice was adiabaticallyapplied to a magnetically trapped condensate initially at
rest in the lab frame. The lattice was created using two
counter-propagating laser beams with frequency difference
, giving the lattice a velocity of v  2 , where  is the
wavelength of the optical lattice. In the rest frame of thelattice, the condensate has quasimomentum k0  m
2@ ,
where m is the atomic mass. By changing the detuning
between the lattice beams, , k0 could be varied. As
shown in Fig. 1(d), as the value of k0 was varied weobserved elastic scattering of atom pairs into final states
k1 and k2 . The range of possible final states varied with k0
due to the phase-matching condition. For values of k0 lessthan  0:55kL the dispersion relation imposed by the
Bloch structure of the optical lattice does not allow elastic
scattering to occur. For our lattice depth of V  0:5Erec ,where Erec  @2 k2L =2m, the values of k2 which satisfied
energy and momentum conservation were beyond the first
Brillouin zone. Since the scattering process occurs within
the first Bloch band, the atoms in state k2 have a quasimomentum k2  2k0  k1 Mod 2kL  [see Fig. 1(a)]. As thevalue for  (and the resulting value of k0 ) is increased, theseparation between k0 and the allowed states k1 and k2
decreases as is clearly observed in Fig. 1(d). For values of020406-1

 2006 The American Physical Society

(a)

(d)

(e)

(a)

δν=4800 Hz

k2
k2

0.8

0.4

(b)

δν=5200 Hz

k0

0.6

k1

δν=5400 Hz

k0

k0=0.64kL

k2

k1

ν1

k0

(c)

δν=5600 Hz

k1

k1

k0

δν=6000 Hz(d)k0=0.69kL

0.08

ν2δν=6000 Hz

k2

kBragg=(ka-kb)(c)-1.0 -0.5 0.0 0.5 1.0
Quasimomentum [kL]

kb

(b)

Fraction of Atoms in k2

Energy [Erec]kak2

δν=4900 Hz

k0=0.59kL

1.2
1.0

week ending
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PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERSPRL 96, 020406 (2006)

k0=0.74kL

k0

0.06
0.04
0.02
0.00
-0.02

FIG. 1. Dispersion curve for the optical lattice and experimental setup. (a) Band structure for a lattice depth of V  0:5Erec .
The dashed line shows the free particle dispersion curve. The
dispersion relation of the lattice allows two atoms with momentum k0 to elastically scatter into the final momentum states k1
and k2 . Energy and quasimomentum are conserved when k0 is
the average of k1 and k2 and the three points on the dispersion
curve lie on a straight line. If k0 is varied, the allowed values for
k1 and k2 change. For values of k0 below  0:55kL , where kL is
the wave vector of the optical lattice, atoms cannot scatter
elastically into different momentum states. The circles (squares)
show allowed states k0 ; k1 ; k2 for k0  0:66kL (0:70kL ). As k0 isincreased, the final momentum states move closer together. Since
the scattering occurs within the lowest band of the lattice, thefinal momentum is k2  2k0  k1 Mod 2kL . (b) A 87 Rb BoseEinstein condensate is illuminated by two counter-propagating
laser beams with detuning , which create a moving opticallattice. The condensate is initially held at rest. In the rest frameof the lattice, the condensate has quasimomentum k0  m
2@ .
(c) As k0 was varied, we observed elastic scattering into states k1
and k2 . (d) Absorption images for different lattice detunings, ,showing parametric generation. After ramping up the lattice, theatoms were held for 10 ms at a constant lattice depth. They werethen released from the trap and imaged after 43 ms of ballistic
expansion. The field of view is 0:5 mm  0:3 mm.

k0 above  0:75kL , the final momentum states were nolonger distinguishable, and the condensate became
unstable.
To demonstrate the matter-wave analogue of an OPA,
we first created a small seed of atoms with quasimomentum k1 before ramping on the moving lattice (see Fig. 2).
To create the seed we applied a Bragg pulse to the magnetically trapped condensate, outcoupling a small fractionof atoms into the momentum state kBragg [19]. Immediately
after applying the pulse, the optical lattice was adiabatically ramped on. In the rest frame of the lattice, the seedhas quasimomentum k1  kBragg  k0 . The phasematching condition for a given seed kBragg was found byvarying the frequency difference  of the lattice, andtherefore the quasimomenta k0 and k1 of the atoms. As
shown in Fig. 2(d), when the phase-matching condition
was fulfilled, we observed amplification of the seed k1 as

4600

5000

5400

5800

6200

Lattice Detuning [Hz]FIG. 2. Parametric amplification of scattered atom pairs in a
1D optical lattice. (a) First, a 2 ms Bragg pulse was applied to thecondensate. (b) The Bragg pulse seeded atoms along the longaxis of the condensate with momentum kBragg  ka  kb  in thelab frame. (c) The optical lattice was then adiabatically ramped
on and applied for 10 ms. When the phase-matching condition
was fulfilled, parametric amplification of atoms in the seededstate k1 and its conjugate momentum state k2 was observed.
(d) Resonance curve showing amplification of k2 , when k1 wasseeded. Amplification occurred only when the phase-matchingcondition was met. For a fixed kBragg , the resonance condition
was found by varying the detuning  of the lattice. The data
was taken for kBragg  0:43kL . The fraction of amplified atoms
was obtained by subtracting images with and without the seedpulse. (e) Absorption images showing amplification of k1 and k2
when the phase-matching condition is met. The center of theresonance was at   5450 Hz, close to the calculated value of  5350 Hz. The width of the resonance is determined by the
Fourier width of the Bragg pulse. Most of the scattered atoms in
the third image were independent of the seed pulse.

well as its conjugate momentum k2 . The growth of k1 andk2 as a function of time are shown in Fig. 3.
The experiments were performed using an elongated
87 Rb condensate created in a magnetic trap previously
described in Ref. [20]. The magnetic trap had a radial(axial) trap frequency of 35(8) Hz. The condensate, containing between 0:5–3:0  105 atoms, was produced in the
j52 S1=2 ; F  1; mF  1i state. The Bragg pulse was created with two laser beams derived from the same laser,which was red detuned from the 52 S1=2 ; F  1 !
52 P3=2 ; F  1 transition at   780 nm by 400 MHz,and was  polarized. As shown in Fig. 2, the Bragg beams
were aligned such that atoms were outcoupled along thelong axis of the condensate. The intensity of the Bragg
pulse was chosen such that less than 5% of the initialcondensate was outcoupled into kBragg , and the length ofthe pulse was 2 ms. The angle between the Bragg beams
could be varied to change the momentum of the outcoupledatoms. The optical lattice was created using two counter-020406-2

PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERSPRL 96, 020406 (2006)(a)Fraction of Atoms

0.30

0.20

0.10

0.00
0

4

0

4

8

12

16

8

12

16

Hold Time (ms)(b)
Fraction of Atoms

0.30

0.20

0.10

0.00

Hold Time (ms)FIG. 3. Growth curve for atomic population in quasimomentum states k1 and k2 when the process was seeded.
(a) Amplification of atoms with quasimomentum k1 (solid
points), and with the conjugate momentum k2 (open points),
when state k1 was seeded. (b) Amplification of atoms in k1 (solid
points), and k2 (open points), when k2 was seeded. The values for
k0 ; k1 ; k2 were 0:66kL , 0:23kL , and 0:92kL respectively. The
solid lines shows the expected gain using Eq. (1) with variable
scale factors for each curve as the only free parameters.

propagating beams derived from the same laser with  1064 nm, and the frequency of the two beams were controlled by two separate acousto-optic modulators (AOMs)
driven with a frequency difference . The lattice was alsoaligned along the long axis of the condensate, and wasramped on in 1 ms using an exponential ramp. After thecondensate was held in the lattice for a variable time  it
was then released from the trap and imaged after 43 ms ofballistic expansion.
For all of our experiments, the depth of the optical lattice
was V  0:5Erec with a band structure shown in Fig. 1.
When the process was not seeded, atoms were elasticallyscattered into a narrow band of states k1 and k2 , where both
energy and momentum were conserved. However, thepopulation in neither state was large enough for amplification to be observed. When the process was seeded, amplification occurred when the quasimomentum was tuned
such that energy and momentum were conserved for thestates k0 , k1 , and the conjugate momentum k2 . In our
experiment, the difference k  k0  k1 between the quasimomenta of the condensate k0 and seed k1 was set by theangle of the initial Bragg pulse. For a given Bragg angle,
there is only one set of quasimomenta k0 , k1 , and k2 where
the phase-matching condition is fulfilled. To find this point,
we varied the velocity of the moving lattice for fixed holdweek ending
20 JANUARY 2006

times. Results for kBragg  0:43kL are shown in Fig. 2. The
phase-matched value for k2 is at 1:08kL , beyond the boundary of the first Briollouin zone. Therefore, the atoms areobserved with a momentum k2  0:92kL . For kBragg 
0:43kL , 0:34kL , and 0:28kL , we observed resonances at  5450 Hz, 5750 Hz, and 6100 Hz, respectively. For
these Bragg angles and our lattice depth, the expectedvalues were 5350 Hz, 5700 Hz, and 6050 Hz.
In Fig. 3, 5% of the initial condensate containing N0 
1:33  105 atoms was outcoupled with kBragg  0:43kL .
The gain for the process is determined by the strength of2athe nonlinear interaction U  4@m between atoms in thecondensate, where a is the s-wave scattering length. We
can estimate the maximum amplification rate to be  
2n0 U=@ [3], with N_ 12  N21 , where N12 is the number of atoms in the momentum state k12 , and n0 is thecondensate density. For N0  1:33  105 , the maximum
growth rate should be   540 Hz. The amplification rate
will decrease as the state k0 is depleted. However, for oursmall seeds, the amplification was limited by the loss ofoverlap between the condensate and the amplified pulses.
The Thomas-Fermi radius (RTF ) of the condensate in theaxial direction was 33 m, and the recoil velocity (vrec )for the final states k1 and k2 with respect to the initialcondensate was vrec  1:8 m=ms and 6:8 m=ms, respectively. The overlap integral between the amplified
atoms and the initial condensate can be approximated asa Gaussian with time constant c  0:75RTF =vrec , which
for our parameters is 3.75 ms. We compare our results tothe modified rate equation22
N_ 21  N12 et =c :(1)

Since atoms are scattered into states k1 and k2 in pairs, one
would expect that the final atom number in the two states(minus the initial seed) are equal. Instead, we observe asmaller number in state k2 which we ascribe to the proximity of k2 to the boundary of Brillouin zone. This leads toinstabilities, where atoms in state k2 are scattered into othermomentum states or into higher bands. If we allow avariable scale factor in our model to correct for the lossof atoms in N2 , as shown in Fig. 3, the gain for N1;2 is inagreement with the experimental data.
Amplification was also observed when atoms wereseeded in state k2 . Because of the geometry of our experimental setup, we were unable to load atoms directly into
k2  0:92kL . However when atoms with quasimomentum k  1:08kL were loaded into the lattice, the ramp-up
was no longer adiabatic due to their proximity to theboundary of the first Brillouin zone. Because of this, atoms
from the seed were loaded into both the second Bloch band(with k  1:08kL ) and the ground state (with k 0:92kL  k2 ). As shown in Fig. 3(b), the gain for thisprocess was almost identical to when atoms were seeded instate k1 .

020406-3

PRL 96, 020406 (2006)

PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS

The loss of overlap could be alleviated by using a more
extreme trap geometry in which the condensate is moreelongated, e.g., by confining atoms in a tight transverse
optical lattice. In this configuration, it may be possible toobserve the parametric scattering dynamics for longer timescales, which may allow for the observation of Rabi oscillations between k0 and k1 , k2 as predicted in Ref. [14]. For
longer coherence times, parametric amplification could
also be an efficient means of producing pairs of momentum
entangled atoms for quantum information applications[12,13], but the issue of secondary collisions out of states
k1 and k2 has to be carefully addressed.
For high atom numbers, and for large values of k0 , thecondensate became unstable and scattered into a broadband of final momentum states [Fig. 2(e)]. For kBragg 
0:43kL , the energy of atoms outcoupled by the Bragg
beams was  370 Hz, whereas the chemical potential of
the condensate was  300 Hz. Because of this, if the atom
number was increased significantly the momentum peaks
were no longer distinguishable. When the chemical potential of the condensate was larger than the separation between the phase-matched momentum states, the process
was self-seeded; i.e., the momentum spread of the initialcondensate contained atoms with momentum k0 , k1 , andk2 , and considerable scattering occurred. Similarly, if theatom number was kept constant, and the value of k0 wasincreased, the phase-matched momentum states moved
closer together until they were no longer distinguishable.
This occurred at values of k0 above  0:75kL , and we
observed a dynamic instability. For larger atom numbers,
the critical value of k0 decreases. For values of k0 less than
0:55k0 elastic scattering cannot occur, and the systemshould be stable for all atom numbers. Instabilities ofcondensates in optical lattices has attracted much attention
recently, both theoretically [21–28] and experimentally[29–33]. Most recently, dynamic instabilities of condensates in moving lattices were observed in Refs. [29,30]. In
Ref. [30], the chemical potential was a factor of 3 higher
than in our experiment, leading to a dynamic instability for
all values of k0 above 0:55kL . Although discrete momentum states could not be observed in those experiments, it ispossible that the mechanism for the dynamic instability is
self-seeded parametric amplification. Indeed, the phasematching condition for parametric amplification is identical to the resonance condition for dynamic instability in thenoninteracting limit [21]. After the submission of thisLetter, recent work on period-doubling instabilities in a
shaken optical lattice [34] was reinterpreted as parametricamplification [35].
In conclusion, we have demonstrated a matter-wave
analogue of both optical parametric generation and opticalparametric amplification using a condensate moving in a
one-dimensional optical lattice. The optical lattice modified the dispersion curve and ensured phase matching. If
the separation of the phase-matched momentum statesweek ending
20 JANUARY 2006

becomes less than the speed of sound, a condensate will
self-seed the process and become dynamically unstable.
The authors thank K. Mølmer for pointing out thisphysical process to us, M. Inguscio and M. Modugno for
insightful discussions, M. Saba for helpful discussions anda critical reading of the manuscript, and P. Medley forexperimental assistance. This work was supported by
NSF and ARO.

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020406-4

Appendix C
Imaging the Mott Insulator Shells
using Atomic Clock Shifts
This appendix contains a reprint of Ref. [12]: G.K. Campbell, J. Mun, M. Boyd, P.
Medley, A.E. Leanhardt, L. G. Marcassa, D.E. Pritchard, and W. Ketterle Imaging
the Mott Insulator Shells by Using Atomic Clock Shifts, Science 313, 649 (2006).

120

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and J.J.L. and R37GM34985 to J.C.D.), NSF (MCB0084509 to J.J.L.), and the Norris Cotton Cancer Centercore grant to Dartmouth Medical School. We thankR. Rothstein for yeast strain W2105-7b, S. Elledge forplasmid pMH267, and both for helpful discussions.

Supporting Online Materialwww.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/1121716/DC1
Materials and Methods
Figs. S1 and S2References

24 October 2005; accepted 11 May 2006
Published online 29 June 2006;
10.1126/science.1121716
Include this information when citing this paper.

REPORTS
Imaging the Mott Insulator Shells
by Using Atomic Clock Shifts
Gretchen K. Campbell,1* Jongchul Mun,1 Micah Boyd,1 Patrick Medley,1Aaron E. Leanhardt,2 Luis G. Marcassa,1† David E. Pritchard,1 Wolfgang Ketterle1
Microwave spectroscopy was used to probe the superfluid–Mott insulator transition of a Bose-Einsteincondensate in a three-dimensional optical lattice. By using density-dependent transition frequency
shifts, we were able to spectroscopically distinguish sites with different occupation numbers and todirectly image sites with occupation numbers from one to five, revealing the shell structure of the Mott
insulator phase. We used this spectroscopy to determine the onsite interaction and lifetime forindividual shells.
he Mott insulator (MI) transition is aparadigm of condensed matter physics,
describing how electron correlations canlead to insulating behavior even for partially filled
conduction bands. However, this behavior
requires a commensurable ratio between electronsand sites. If this condition for the density is notexactly fulfilled, the system will be conductive.
For neutral bosonic particles, the equivalent
phenomenon is the transition from a superfluid
to an insulator for commensurable densities. In
inhomogeneous systems, as in atom traps, thecondition of commensurability no longer applies: For sufficiently strong interparticle interactions, it is predicted that the system should
separate into MI shells with different occupation number, separated by thin superfluidlayers (1–3).
The recent observation of the superfluidto-MI transition with ultracold atoms (4) has
stimulated a large number of theoretical and experimental studies E(5) and references therein^.
Atomic systems allow for a full range of controlof the experimental parameters, including tunability of the interactions and defect-free preparation, making them attractive systems forstudying condensed matter phenomena. The MI

T

1
MIT-Harvard Center for Ultracold Atoms, Research Laboratory of Electronics, Department of Physics, Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA. 2JILA,
Boulder, CO 80309, USA.

*To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail:gcampbel@mit.edu†Permanent address: Instituto de Fisica de São Carlos,
University of São Paulo, São Paulo 13560-970, Brazil.

phase in ultracold atoms has been characterized
by studies of coherence, excitation spectrum,
noise correlations (4, 6, 7), and molecule
formation (8). Recently, by using spin-changing
collisions, Gerbier et al. selectively addressed
lattice sites with two atoms and observed the
suppression of number fluctuations (9).
In this study, we combined atoms in the MIphase with the high-resolution spectroscopy used
for atomic clocks and used density-dependenttransition frequency shifts to spectroscopicallyresolve the layered structure of the Mott shells
with occupancies from n 0 1 to n 0 5 and todirectly image their spatial distributions.
Bosons with repulsive interactions in an
optical lattice can qualitatively be described by
the Hamiltonian (10, 1),
Ĥ 0 jJXbi, jÀ

â.i aj þ 1=2 UXXn̂i ðn̂i j 1Þ þiðei j mÞn̂i

ð1Þ

i

where the first two terms are the usual
Hamiltonian for the Bose-Hubbard model, thelast term adds in the external trapping potential,
and J is the tunneling term between nearest
neighbors, â.i and âi are the boson creation anddestruction operators at a given lattice site. U 0(4pI2a/m)Xkw(x)k4d3x is the repulsive onsite
interaction, where I is Planck_s constant divided
by 2p, m is the atomic mass, a is the s-wave
scattering length, w(x) is the single particle
Wannier function localized to the ith lattice site,
and n̂i 0 â.i âi is the number operator for bosonswww.sciencemag.org

SCIENCEVOL 313at site i. The last term in the Hamiltonian is dueto the external trapping confinement of theatoms, where ei 0 Vext(ri ) is the energy offset
at the ith site due to the external confinement
and m is the chemical potential.
The behavior of this system is determined by
the ratio J/U. For low lattice depths, the ratio islarge and the system is superfluid. For larger
lattice depths, the repulsive onsite energy begins
to dominate, and the system undergoes aquantum phase transition to a MI phase. For
deep lattices, the atoms are localized to individual lattice sites with integer filling factor n. Thisfilling factor varies locally depending on thelocal chemical potential mi 0 m j ei as
n 0 Modðmi =U Þð2Þwhere Mod is the modulo and decreases fromthe center to the edge of the trap.
To prepare the atoms in the Mott insulatingphase, we first created a 87Rb Bose-Einsteincondensate in the the kF 0 1, mF 0 j1À state(where F and mF are the quantum numbers forthe total spin and its t component, respectively)by using a combination of an Ioffe-Pritchardmagnetic trap and an optical dipole trap. The
optical trap was oriented perpendicular to thelong axis of the magnetic trap, creating a moreisotropic trapping potential that was better
matched to the optical lattice. The laser beam
for the optical trap had a 1/e 2 waist , 70 mm
and was retroreflected. However, the polarization of the retroreflected beam was rotated suchthat the interference between the two beams
had minimal contrast. The resulting trap hadradial and axial trap frequencies of w 0 2p 
70 Hz and w 0 2p  20 Hz, respectively, where
the axial direction is now parallel to the optical
trap. A three-dimensional (3D) optical lattice
was created by adding two additional retroreflected laser beams derived from the same laser
at l 0 1064 nm. The lattice was adiabaticallyramped up by rotating the polarization of theretroreflected optical trapping beam to increase
the interference contrast along that axis and byincreasing the laser power in the other two axes.
The lattice depth was increased by using an
exponential ramp with a 40-ms time constant.
After ramping on the lattice, all three beams werelinearly polarized orthogonal to each other and4 AUGUST 2006

649

REPORTS
had different frequency detunings generated byusing acousto-optic modulators. The lattice depth
was up to 40Erec, where Erec 0 I2k2/2m is therecoil energy and k 0 2p/l is the wave vector of
the lattice light. At 40Erec, the lattice trap
frequency at each site was wlat 0 2p  25 kHz,and the external trap frequencies increased tow 0 2p  110 Hz and w 0 2p  30 Hz in theradial and axial directions, respectively.
Zeeman shifts and broadening of the clocktransition from the F 0 1 to the F 0 2 state were
avoided by using a two photon transition
between the k1, j1À state and the k2, 1À state,
where at a magnetic bias field of È 3.23 G bothstates have the same first-order Zeeman shift(11). The two-photon pulse was composed of
one microwave photon at a fixed frequency of
6.83 GHz and one radio frequency (rf) photon ata frequency of around 1.67 MHz. The pulse had
a duration of 100 ms, and when on resonancethe fraction of atoms transferred to the k2, 1À

state was less than 20%. After the pulse, atoms
in the k2, 1À state were selectively detected withabsorption imaging by using light resonant withthe 52S/ k2, 1À Y 52P/ k3, 1À transition. For
observing the spatial distribution of the Mott
shells, we imaged the atoms in the trap. For
recording spectra, we released the atoms fromthe trap and imaged them after 3 ms of ballistic
expansion in order to reduce the column density.
When the two-photon spectroscopy is performed on a trapped condensate without a lattice,
the atoms transferred to the k2, 1À state have aslightly different mean field energy because of thedifference between a21 and a11 scattering lengths,
where a21 is the scattering length between two
atoms in states k2, 1À and k1, j1À and a11 is thescattering length between two atoms in the
k1, j1À state. This difference in scattering
lengths leads to a density-dependent shift to theresonance frequency, Dn º r(a21 j a11), wherer is the condensate density (11). This collisional
1

3

2

2

shift is commonly referred to as the clock shift(12) because of its importance in atomic clocks,
where cold collisions currently limit the accuracy (13, 14). When performed on a condensate
with peak density r0 in a harmonic trap in thelimit of weak excitation, the line shape for thetwo-photon resonance is given by (15):15hðv j v0 ÞIðvÞ 0
4r0 DEsﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃﬃ
hðv j v0 Þ
1j
r0 DE

ð3Þ

where n0 is the hyperfine transition frequency
and the mean field energy difference is
DE 0h2ða21 j a11 Þpm

ð4ÞIn the case of 87Rb, a21 0 5.19 nm and a11 0
5.32 nm (16). Both the frequency shift and thelinewidth increase with the condensate density.
As the lattice is ramped on, the peak density of
the condensate in a given lattice site increases asr0 ðrÞ 0 m j 1=2 mw2trap r2 1=U

ð5Þ

where wtrap is the external trap frequency for the
combined magnetic and optical trap, and, byusing the Thomas-Fermi approximation m, thechemical potential, is given by"
m0

Fig. 1. Two-photon spectroscopy across the superfluid-to-MI transition. Spectra for 3D lattice depths of
0Erec (open squares), 5Erec (open triangles), 10Erec (open circles), 25Erec (solid squares), and 35Erec(solid circles) are shown. The spectra are offset for clarity. The shift in the center of the n 0 1 peak as
the lattice depth is increased is due to the differential AC Stark shift from the lattice. The dotted lines
show Gaussian fits of the peaks.
Fig. 2. Probing theonsite interaction energy.
(A) The separation between the n 0 1 andn 0 2 peaks is shown for
lattice depths of V 0
25Erec (square) and V 0
35Erec (circle). As thelattice depth was increased, the separation
increased from 22(1) Hz
to 30(1) Hz. The shaded
area gives the expected value determined from a band structure
calculation, including the uncertainty in the scattering lengths. The
uncertainty in the measured separation is indicated by the size of thepoints. (B) Location of resonances for all MI phases relative to the n 0 1
phase for V 0 25Erec and V 0 35Erec. For low site occupation (n values

650

4 AUGUST 2006

VOL 3133=

3
3
2=16 ðl=2Þ mpﬃﬃﬃ NU wtrap
2p

15

#2=5
ð6Þ

where N is the total atom number. For low lattice
depths, the system is still a superfluid, delocalized
over the entire lattice. However, the two-photon
resonance line is shifted and broadened becauseof the increased density, with the center of theresonance at n 0 n0 þ 2r0DE/3h. For deep
lattices in the MI regime, the repulsive onsite
interaction dominates, number fluctuations aresuppressed, and each lattice site has a sharp
resonance frequency determined by the occupation number in the site. The separation between

from 1 to 3), the separation between the resonances is roughly constant,
implying constant U. For V 0 35Erec, the separation between the n 0 4 andn 0 5 peaks was 22(2) Hz, a 27% decrease from the 30(1) Hz separation
between the n 0 1 and n 0 2 peaks. The slope of the lines is fit to theseparation between the n 0 1 and n 0 2 peaks.
SCIENCEwww.sciencemag.org

REPORTS
the resonance frequencies for the n and n j 1
MI phases is given by
dv 0Uða21 j a11 Þ=a11h

ð7Þ

The linewidth of the resonances is no longer
broadened by the inhomogeneous density andshould be limited only by the bandwidth of thetwo-photon pulse.
The resonance transitioned from a broadenedline to several sharp lines as the lattice depth wasincreased (Fig. 1). At a lattice depth of V 0 5Erec,the line was broadened and the line center was
shifted slightly because of the increased density.
At V 0 10Erec, the line was shifted and broadened
further, and in addition the line shape became
asymmetric as the atom number in lattice sites
with small occupation was squeezed. For deeper
lattice depths, the system underwent a phasetransition to a MI phase, and discrete peaks
appeared, corresponding to MI phases withdifferent filling factors; for V 0 35Erec, MI phaseswith occupancies of up to five were observed.
When the lattice depth was increased inside
the MI regime (from V 0 25Erec to V 0 35Erec),the separation between the resonance peaks
increased, presumably because of the larger
onsite interaction energy as the lattice trap wasincreased. As given in Eq. 7, the separation
between the peaks provides a direct measurement of the onsite interaction energy, U. Our
results are in good agreement with calculated
values of U (Fig. 2A). Although the separation
between the n 0 1, n 0 2, and n 0 3 peaks isroughly constant, for higher filling factors theseparation between the peaks decreases; theeffective onsite interaction energy becomes
smaller for higher filling factors (Fig. 2B). This
result shows that for low occupation numbers theatoms occupy the ground state wave function of
the lattice site, whereas for larger occupation
numbers, the repulsive onsite interaction causes
the wave function to spread out, lowering theinteraction energy. From a variational calculation of the wave function similar to (17), we

find that the onsite energy for the n 0 5 shellshould be È20% smaller than that for the n 0 1
shell, in agreement with the measured value(Fig. 2B).
The peaks for the different occupation
numbers were spectrally well separated. Therefore, on resonance, only atoms from a single
shell were transferred to the k2, 1À state. An
image of these atoms (without any time offlight) shows the spatial distribution of thisshell. Figure 3B shows absorption images forn 0 1 to n 0 5 shells. As predicted (1), the n 0 1
MI phase appears near the outer edge of thecloud. For larger n, the radius of the shelldecreases, and the n 0 5 sites form a core in
the center of the cloud. The expected radius foreach shell was obtained from Eq. 2 by using
the measured values for the onsite interaction.
The observed radii were in good agreement
except for the n 0 1 shell, which may havebeen affected by anharmonicities in the external trap. Absorption images taken with rf
values between the peaks show a small signal,
which may reflect the predicted thin superfluidlayers between the insulating shells; however,this needs be studied further with improved
signal-to-noise ratio. The expected absorption

image of a shell should show a column densitywith a flat distribution in the center and raisededges. However, because of limitations (resolution and residual fringes) in our imaging
system, these edges were not resolved.
Because we were able to address the different MI phases separately, we could determine
the lifetime for each shell. For this, the atoms
were first held in the lattice for a variable time t
before applying the 100-ms two-photon pulse.
For the n 0 1 MI phase and ignoring technicalnoise, the lifetime should only be limited byspontaneous scattering from the lattice beams.
Even for the deepest lattices, the spontaneous
scattering rate is less than 10j2 Hz. For the n 0
2 MI phase, the lifetime is limited by dipolar
relaxation, which for 87Rb is slow, with a rate G
10j2 Hz. For sites with n Q 3, the lifetime islimited by three-body recombination with a rateequal to gn(n j 1)(n j 2) (18), with g 0 0.026
Hz for our parameters. This gives three-body
lifetimes of t3B of 6.2 s, 1.6 s, and 0.6 s for then 0 3, n 0 4, and n 0 5 MI phases, respectively.
This calculation of g assumes for the density
distribution the ground state of the harmonic
oscillator potential, so for higher filling factors the actual lifetime could be higher. We
Fig. 4. Lifetime of individual MI shells.The lifetime foreach MI phase can bemeasured independently byadding a hold time before
applying the two-photon
pulse. Spectra are shownfor hold times of 0 ms (solid
circles), 100 ms (solid
squares), 400 ms (opencircles), and 2000 ms (opensquares). The lattice depth
was V 0 35Erec except forthe 100-ms hold time, forwhich it was V 0 34Erec. Thelines show Gaussian fits tothe peaks, and the spectra
were offset for clarity.

Fig. 3. Imaging the shell structure of the MI. (A) Spectrum of the MI at V 0
35Erec. (B) Absorption images for for decreasing rf frequencies. Images a toe were taken on resonance with the peaks shown in (A) and display thespatial distribution of the n 01 to n 0 5 shells. The solid lines shows thepredicted contours of the shells. Absorption images taken for rf frequencies between the peaks (images i to iv) show a much smaller signal. The field ofview was 185 mm by 80 mm.
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REPORTS
show relative populations as a function of thehold time and derive lifetimes as t almost
equal to 1 s, 0.5 s, and 0.2 s for the n 0 3, n 04, and n 0 5 MI phases, respectively (Fig. 4);
this is shorter than predicted, which is possibly
due to secondary collisions. For n 0 1 and n 02, lifetimes of over 5 s were observed.
We expect that this method can be used tomeasure the number statistics as the system undergoes the phase transition. One would expectthat the spectral peaks for higher occupation number become pronounced only at higher lattice
depth; an indication of this can be seen already in
Fig. 1. For low lattice depths, the tunneling rate isstill high, but one can suddenly increase the lattice depth and freeze in populations (19), which
can then be probed with high-resolution spectroscopy. Fluctuations in the atom number could
identify the superfluid layers between the Mott
shells. In addition, by applying a magnetic gradient across the lattice, tomographic slices could
be selected, combining full 3D resolution with
spectral resolution of the site occupancy. These
techniques may address questions about local
properties that have been raised in recent theoretical simulations (20). The addressability of

individual shells could be used to create systems
with only selected occupation numbers (e.g., byremoving atoms in other shells). Such a preparation could be important for the implementation ofquantum gates, for which homogenous filling isdesirable. For atoms other than rubidium, atomic
clock shifts are much larger, e.g., for sodium,larger by a factor of 30. Therefore, it should beeasier to resolve the MI shells, unless thecollisional lifetime of the upper state of the clocktransition sets a severe limit to the pulse duration.
Note added in proof: After submission ofthis work, the vertical profile of an n 0 2 MIshell was obtained by using spin-changing
collisions and a magnetic resonance imaging
technique (21).
References and Notes
1. D. Jaksch, C. Bruder, J. I. Cirac, C. W. Gardiner, P. Zoller,
Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 3108 (1998).
2. G. G. Batrouni et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 117203 (2002).
3. B. Marco, C. Lannert, S. Vishveshwara, T. C. Wei, Phys.
Rev. A. 71, 063601 (2005).
4. M. Greiner, O. Mandel, T. Esslinger, T. W. Hänsch, I. Bloch,
Nature 415, 39 (2002).
5. I. Bloch, Nature Phys. 1, 23 (2005).
6. T. Stöferle, H. Moritz, C. Schori, M. Köhl, T. Esslinger,
Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 130403 (2004).

Evidence for a Past High-Eccentricity
Lunar Orbit
Ian Garrick-Bethell,* Jack Wisdom, Maria T. Zuber
The large differences between the Moon’s three principal moments of inertia have been a mysterysince Laplace considered them in 1799. Here we present calculations that show how past higheccentricity orbits can account for the moment differences, represented by the low-order lunar
gravity field and libration parameters. One of our solutions is that the Moon may have once been
in a 3:2 resonance of orbit period to spin period, similar to Mercury’s present state. The possibilityof past high-eccentricity orbits suggests a rich dynamical history and may influence ourunderstanding of the early thermal evolution of the Moon.
he Moon is generally thought to haveaccreted close to the Earth and migrated
outwards in a synchronously locked loweccentricity orbit. During the early part of thismigration, the Moon was cooling and continuallysubjected to tidal and rotational stretching. The
principal moments of inertia A G B G C of any
satellite are altered in a predictable way by
deformation due to spin and tidal attraction. The
moments are typically characterized by ratiosthat are easier to measure, namely, the libration
parameters b 0 (C – A)/B and g 0 (B – A)/C,
and the degree-2 spherical-harmonic gravity
coefficients C20 0 (2C – B – A)/(2Mr2) andC22 0 (B – A)/(4Mr2), where M and r are thesatellite mass and radius. Of these four values

T

Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 77 Massachusetts
Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
*To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail:iang@mit.edu

652

b, g, and C20 can be taken as independent.
Using the ratio (C – A)/A, Laplace was the firstto observe that the lunar moments are not in
equilibrium with the Moon_s current orbital
state (1). He did not, however, address thepossibility of a Bfossil bulge,[ or the frozen
remnant of a state when the Moon was closer tothe Earth. Sedgwick examined the lunar
moments in 1898, as did Jeffreys in 1915 and1937, and both authors effectively showed thatb is too large for the current orbit, suggestingthat the Moon may carry a fossil bulge (2–5).
However, Jeffreys showed that the fossil
hypothesis might be untenable because the ratioof g/b 0 0.36 does not match the predicted ratioof 0.75 for a circular synchronous orbit (equivalently, C20/C22 0 9.1, instead of the predictedratio of 3.33). Indeed, using data from (6), noneof the three independent measures of moments
represent a low-eccentricity synchronous-orbithydrostatic form; C20 0 2.034  10j4 is 22
times too large for the current state, and b 0

4 AUGUST 2006

VOL 313SCIENCE7. S. Fölling et al., Nature 434, 481 (2005).
8. T. Volz et al., published online 8 May 2006
(http://arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat?papernum00605184).
9. F. Gerbier, S. Fölling, A. Widera, O. Mandel, I. Bloch,
Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 090401 (2006).
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Phys. Rev. B 40, 546 (1989).
11. D. M. Harber, H. J. Lewandowski, J. M. McGuirk,
E. A. Cornell, Phys. Rev. A. 66, 053616 (2002).
12. K. Gibble, S. Chu, Phys. Rev. Lett. 70, 1771 (1993).
13. C. Fertig, K. Gibble, Phys. Rev. Lett. 85, 1622 (2000).
14. Y. Sortais et al., Phys. Scr. T95, 50 (2001).
15. J. Stenger et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 82, 4569 (1999).
16. E. G. M. van Kempen, S. J. J. M. F. Kokkelmans, D. J. Heinzen,
B. J. Verhaar, Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 093201 (2002).
17. G. Baym, C. J. Pethick, Phys. Rev. Lett. 76, 6 (1996).
18. M. W. Jack, M. Yamashita, Phys. Rev. A 67, 033605(2005).
19. M. Greiner, O. Mandel, T. W. Hänsch, I. Bloch, Nature
419, 51 (2002).
20. O. Gygi, H. G. Katzgraber, M. Troyer, S. Wessel,
G. G. Batrouni, Phys. Rev. A. 73, 063606 (2006).
21. S. Fölling, A. Widera, T. Mueller, F. Gerbier, I. Bloch,
published online 23 June 2006 (http://arxiv.org/abs/
cond-mat?papernum00606592).
22. The authors thank I. Bloch and S. Fölling for insightful
discussions. This work was supported by NSF. L.G.M. also
acknowledges support from Fundac$ão de Apoio a Pesquisa
do Estrado de São Paulo.
23 May 2006; accepted 7 July 2006
10.1126/science.1130365

6.315  10j4 and g 0 2.279  10j4 are 17 and8 times too large, respectively (7, 8).
The inappropriate ratio of g/b or C20/C22 has
led some to dismiss the fossil bulge hypothesis as noise due to random density anomalies(9, 10). However, the power of the seconddegree harmonic gravity field is anomalously
high when compared to the power expectedfrom back extrapolating the power of higher
harmonics (7, 11). This suggests that the bulge
may be interpreted as a signal of someprocess. Degree-2 mantle convection has been
proposed as a means of deforming the Moon
(12, 13), but the dissimilarity of all three principal moments violates the symmetry of any
simple degree-2 convection model (12). The
Moon_s center-of-mass/center-of-figure offset
influences the moment parameters slightly,
but that problem is geophysically separate andmathematically insignificant to the degree-2
problem (8, 14).
Because C20 is due primarily to rotational
flattening, and C22 is due to tidal stretching,
the high C20/C22 ratio seems to imply that theMoon froze in its moments while rotating
faster than synchronous. However, in suchcases no constant face would be presented to
the Earth for any C22 power to form in aunique lunar axis. This apparent dilemma can
be avoided by considering that in any eccentric orbit with an orbit period to spin period
ratio given by n:2, with n 0 2, 3, 4, I, thepassage through pericenter results in higher
C22 stresses throughout a single elongatedaxis (hereafter called the pericenter axis).
When the stresses experienced over one orbit
period are time-averaged, the highest stresses

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Appendix D
Raman amplification of Matter
Waves
This appendix contains a reprint of Ref. [99]: D. Schneble, G.K. Campbell, E.W.
Streed, M. Boyd, D.E. Pritchard, and W. Ketterle, Raman amplification of matterwaves, Phys. Rev. A 69, 041601(R) (2004).

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