Sub-Doppler Laser Cooling of Thulium Atoms in a Magneto-optical Trap

Abstract

We have experimentally studied sub-Doppler laser cooling in a magneto-optical trap for thulium atoms working at the wavelength of 410.6\,nm. Without any dedicated molasses period of sub-Doppler cooling, the cloud of $3\times 10^6$ atoms at the temperature of 25(5)\,$\mu$K was observed. The measured temperature is significantly lower than the Doppler limit of 240$\mu$K for the cooling transition at 410.6\,nm. High efficiency of the sub-Doppler cooling process is due to a near-degeneracy of the Landé-$g$ factors of the lower $4f^{13}6s^2(J=7/2)$ and the upper $4f^{12}5d_{3/2}6s^2(J=9/2)$ cooling levels.}

arXiv comment4 pages, 4 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Magneto-Optical Trap for Thulium Atoms
• Negative-index bi-anisotropic photonic metamaterial fabricated by direct laser writing and silver shadow evaporation
• Sub-Doppler laser cooling and magnetic trapping of erbium

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Dipolar physics: A review of experiments with magnetic quantum gases
• Narrow-line magneto-optical trap for erbium
• Two-temperature momentum distribution in a Thulium magneto-optical trap
• Light assisted collisions in ultra-cold Tm atoms
• Synchronous Comparison of Two Thulium Optical Clocks