Microtraps for neutral atoms using superconducting structures in the critical state

Abstract

Recently demonstrated superconducting atom-chips provide a platform for trapping atoms and coupling them to solid-state quantum systems. Controlling these devices requires a full understanding of the supercurrent distribution in the trapping structures. For type-II superconductors, this distribution is hysteretic in the critical state due to the partial penetration of the magnetic field in the thin superconducting film through pinned vortices. We report here an experimental observation of this memory effect. Our results are in good agreement with the redictions of the Bean model of the critical state without adjustable parameters. The memory effect allows to write and store permanent currents in micron-sized superconducting structures and paves the way towards new types of engineered trapping potentials.

accepted in Phys. Rev. A

References in corpus (8)

• Reversible state transfer between superconducting qubits and atomic ensembles
• Persistent Supercurrent Atom Chip
• Meissner effect in superconducting microtraps
• Bose-Einstein condensation on a superconducting atom chip
• Spin flip lifetimes in superconducting atom chips: BCS versus Eliashberg theory
• Measurement of the trapping lifetime close to a cold metallic surface on a cryogenic atom-chip
• Macroscopic entanglement between a Bose Einstein condensate and a superconducting loop
• Macroscopic Entanglement of a Bose Einstein Condensate on a Superconducting Atom Chip

Cited by in corpus (13)

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• Trapping of ultra cold atoms in a 3He/4He dilution refrigerator
• Sensitivity of ultracold atoms to quantized flux in a superconducting ring
• Programmable trap geometries with superconducting atom chips
• Magnetic confinement of neutral atoms based on patterned vortex distributions in superconducting disks and rings
• Heating rate and spin flip lifetime due to near field noise in layered superconducting atom chips
• Memory Effects in Spontaneous Emission Processes
• 3D modeling of magnetic atom traps on type-II superconductor chips
• Current-induced magnetization hysteresis defines atom trapping in a superconducting atomchip
• Single vortex fluctuations in a superconducting chip as generating dephasing and spin flips in cold atom traps
• Optimal thickness of rectangular superconducting microtraps for cold atomic gases
• The design of an experimental platform for hybridization of atomic and superconducting quantum systems
• Trapping neutral atoms in the field of a vortex pinned by a superconducting nano-disc