Optical response of gas-phase atoms at less than $\lambda /80$ from a dielectric surface

Abstract

We present experimental observations of atom-light interactions within tens of nanometers (down to 11~nm) of a sapphire surface. Using photon counting we detect the fluorescence from of order one thousand Rb or Cs atoms, confined in a vapor with thickness much less than the optical excitation wavelength. The asymmetry in the spectral lineshape provides a direct read-out of the atom-surface potential. A numerical fit indicates a power-law $-C_{\alpha }/r^{\alpha }$ with $\alpha =3.02\pm 0.06$ confirming that the van der Waals interaction dominates over other effects. The extreme sensitivity of our photon-counting technique may allow the search for atom-surface bound states.

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• Strong coupling and high contrast all optical modulation in atomic cladding waveguides
• Selective reflection from Rb layer with thickness below $\lambda$/12 and applications
• The Hilbert transform: Applications to atomic spectra
• Nano-structured alkali-metal vapor cells
• Fabrication and characterization of super-polished wedged borosilicate nano-cells
• Atom-surface physics: A review
• Optical transmission of an atomic vapor in the mesoscopic regime
• Effect of line broadening on the performance of Faraday filters
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• Collapse and revival of a Dicke-type coherent narrowing in potassium vapor confined in a nanometric-thin cell
• Spectroscopic detection of atom-surface interactions in an atomic vapour layer with nanoscale thickness
• Casimir-Polder effect with thermally excited surfaces
• Wide range linear magnetometer based on a sub-microsized K vapor cell
• Selective reflection from a Potassium atomic layer with a thickness as small as $\lambda /13$
• Comment on "Optical Response of Gas-Phase Atoms at Less than lambda/80 from a Dielectric Surface" published by K. A. Whittaker et al.