Control and manipulation of cold atoms in optical tweezers

Abstract

Neutral atoms trapped by laser light are among the most promising candidates for storing and processing information in a quantum computer or simulator. The application certainly calls for a scalable and flexible scheme for addressing and manipulating the atoms. We have now made this a reality by implementing a fast and versatile method to dynamically control the position of neutral atoms trapped in optical tweezers. The tweezers result from a spatial light modulator (SLM) controlling and shaping a large number of optical dipole-force traps. Trapped atoms adapt to any change in the potential landscape, such that one can rearrange and randomly access individual sites within atom-trap arrays.

Conjugate gradient minimisation approach to generating holographic traps for ultracold atoms

“…In this context, arbitrary time-dependent optical trapping potentials are particularly appealing, with a variety of geometries including toroids and ring lattices already realised by acousto-optic or holographic means [3,4]. Experiments have been performed with discrete arrays of optical dipole traps, loaded with either thermal atoms [4,5] or quantum degenerate atomic gases [3,6,7], in which individual trapping sites can be moved, addressed and manipulated.…”

“…In this context, arbitrary time-dependent optical trapping potentials are particularly appealing, with a variety of geometries including toroids and ring lattices already realised by acousto-optic or holographic means [3,4]. Experiments have been performed with discrete arrays of optical dipole traps, loaded with either thermal atoms [4,5] or quantum degenerate atomic gases [3,6,7], in which individual trapping sites can be moved, addressed and manipulated. Important too are continuous trapping geometries: the primary subject of the present work are extended (as opposed to diffractionlimited) power-law potentials, proposed both as a static supplement to a trapping potential to cancel unwanted external potentials [8], and in a dynamic sequence as a tool for the efficient production of Bose-Einstein condensates [9].…”

“…Technologies employed so far in the realisation of these arbitrary optical trapping patterns include acousto-optic deflection of a laser beam to produce either a composite static intensity distribution [8] or a rapidly-scanned profile [3,7,11], digital micro-mirror devices (DMDs) [4], and computer-generated holograms implemented with phase-only spatial light modulators (SLMs) [5,6,9,10,[12][13][14][15]. The high phase-resolution available in phase-only SLMs offers significant advantages for versatility of the accessible trapping patterns, though at the cost of lower switching speed between frames if compared to acousto-optic modulators and digital mirror devices.…”

Strain-Induced Landau Levels in Arbitrary Dimensions with an Exact Spectrum

“…This will be the subject of future work. We note that pseudomagnetic fields and the associated pseudo-Landau levels in d = 1, 2, 3 could in principle be realized in cold-atom settings [27,28] which also enable tunable interactions.…”

Entanglement control via reservoir engineering in ultracold atomic gases

“…For the case described in Fig. 4 in which L and D are not in a simple ratio, one needs to use a different trapping mechanism for the impurities, for example arrays of microtraps [27] or of optical tweezers [28].…”