Frequency Stabilization of a 369 nm Diode Laser by Nonlinear Spectroscopy of Ytterbium Ions in a Discharge

Abstract

We demonstrate stabilisation of an ultraviolet diode laser via Doppler free spectroscopy of Ytterbium ions in a discharge. Our technique employs polarization spectroscopy, which produces a natural dispersive lineshape whose zero-crossing is largely immune to environmental drifts, making this signal an ideal absolute frequency reference for Yb${}^{+}$ ion trapping experiments. We stabilise an external-cavity diode laser near 369 nm for cooling Yb${}^{+}$ ions, using amplitude-modulated polarisation spectroscopy and a commercial PID feedback system. We achieve stable, low-drift locking with a standard deviation of measured laser frequency ~400 kHz over 10 minutes, limited by the instantaneous linewidth of the diode laser. These results and the simplicity of our optical setup makes our approach attractive for stabilization of laser sources in atomic-physics applications.

Related papers available at http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~mbiercuk/Publications.html

References in corpus (4)

• Quantum Teleportation Between Distant Matter Qubits
• Frequency stabilization of an ultraviolet laser to ions in a discharge
• Optogalvanic Spectroscopy of Metastable States in Yb^{+}
• Quantum measurements and new concepts for experiments with trapped ions

Cited by in corpus (7)

• Laser frequency stabilization using a commercial wavelength meter
• Frequency stability of a wavelength meter and applications to laser frequency stabilization
• Compact Yb${}^{+}$ optical atomic clock project: design principle and current status
• Tutorial on laser locking techniques and the manufacturing of vapor cells for spectroscopy
• Ultraviolet laser spectroscopy of aluminum atoms in hollow-cathode lamp
• High-performance frequency stabilization of ultraviolet diode lasers by using dichroic atomic vapor spectroscopy and transfer cavity
• Coupled Optical Resonance Laser Lockin