Active Control of Laser Wavefronts in Atom Interferometers

Abstract

Wavefront aberrations are identified as a major limitation in quantum sensors. They are today the main contribution in the uncertainty budget of best cold atom interferometers based on two-photon laser beam splitters, and constitute an important limit for their long-term stability, impeding these instruments from reaching their full potential. Moreover, they will also remain a major obstacle in future experiments based on large momentum beam splitters. In this article, we tackle this issue by using a deformable mirror to control actively the laser wavefronts in atom interferometry. In particular, we demonstrate in an experimental proof of principle the efficient correction of wavefront aberrations in an atomic gravimeter.

References in corpus (14)

• Atom Interferometers
• Precision Measurement of the Newtonian Gravitational Constant Using Cold Atoms
• New determination of the fine structure constant and test of the quantum electrodynamics
• Continuous Cold-atom Inertial Sensor with $1{\text{nrad.s}}^{-1}$ Rotation Stability
• Limits to the sensitivity of a low noise compact atomic gravimeter
• Mobile quantum gravity sensor with unprecedented stability
• Quantum Tests of the Einstein Equivalence Principle with the STE-QUEST Space Mission
• Stability comparison of two absolute gravimeters: optical versus atomic interferometers
• Hybridizing matter-wave and classical accelerometers
• Atom interferometry in an optical cavity
• The effect of wavefront aberrations in atom interferometry
• Off-resonant Raman transitions impact in an atom interferometer
• A simple laser system for atom interferometry
• Effective velocity distribution in an atom gravimeter: effect of the convolution with the response of the detection

Cited by in corpus (10)

• Gravity measurements below $10^{-9}$ $g$ with a transportable absolute quantum gravimeter
• Improving the accuracy of atom interferometers with ultracold sources
• Multi-axis atom interferometer gyroscope with a single source of atoms
• Testing the Universality of Free Fall using correlated ${}^{39}$K -- ${}^{87}$Rb interferometers
• Generation of high-purity, low-temperature samples of ${}^{39}$K for applications in metrology
• A prototype industrial laser system for cold atom inertial sensing in space
• Robust inertial sensing with point-source atom interferometry for interferograms spanning a partial period
• Differential wavefront sensing and control using radio-frequency optical demodulation
• Hybrid electrostatic-atomic accelerometer for future space gravity missions
• Tensor gravity gradiometry with a single-axis atom gradiometer