Efficient saturation of an ion in free space

Abstract

We report on the demonstration of a light-matter interface coupling light to a single ${}^{174}{\text{Yb}}^{+}$ ion in free space. The interface is realized through a parabolic mirror partially surrounding the ion. It transforms a Laguerre-Gaussian beam into a linear dipole wave converging at the mirror's focus. By measuring the non-linear response of the atomic transition we deduce the power required for reaching an upper-level population of $1/4$ to be $692\pm 20\text{pW}$ at half linewidth detuning from the atomic resonance. Performing this measurement while scanning the ion through the focus provides a map of the focal intensity distribution. From the measured power we infer a coupling efficiency of $7.2\pm 0.2\%$ on the linear dipole transition when illuminating from half solid angle, being among the best coupling efficiencies reported for a single atom in free space.

5 pages, 3 figures

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Cited by in corpus (16)

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• Time-resolved Scattering of a Single Photon by a Single Atom
• Experimental protocol for high-fidelity heralded photon-to-atom quantum state transfer
• Programmable atom-photon quantum interface
• Frequency tuning of a triply-resonant whispering-gallery mode resonator to MHz wide transitions for proposed quantum repeater schemes
• Dissipation enabled efficient excitation transfer from a single photon to a single quantum emitter
• Time-Reversal-Symmetric Single-Photon Wave Packets for Free-Space Quantum Communication
• Efficient single photon absorption by a trapped moving atom
• 3D mapping of intensity field about the focus of a micrometer scale parabolic mirror
• Shifting the phase of a coherent beam with a ${}^{174}$Yb${}^{+}$ ion: influence of the scattering cross section
• Resonant photo-ionization of Yb+ to Yb2+
• Generation of entangled matter qubits in two opposing parabolic mirrors
• Quantifying the role of thermal motion in free-space light-atom interaction