Positronium laser cooling via the $1^{3}S$-$2^{3}P$ transition with a broadband laser pulse

Abstract

We report on laser cooling of a large fraction of positronium (Ps) in free-flight by strongly saturating the $1^{3}S$-$2^{3}P$ transition with a broadband, long-pulsed 243 nm alexandrite laser. The ground state Ps cloud is produced in a magnetic and electric field-free environment. We observe two different laser-induced effects. The first effect is an increase in the number of atoms in the ground state after the time Ps has spent in the long-lived $3^{3}P$ states. The second effect is the one-dimensional Doppler cooling of Ps, reducing the cloud's temperature from 380(20) K to 170(20) K. We demonstrate a 58(9) % increase in the coldest fraction of the Ps ensemble.

6 pages, 5 figures