paper

An atomic Fabry-Perot interferometer-based acceleration sensor for microgravity environments

arXiv:2411.05352 · doi:10.1038/s41526-025-00499-4

Abstract

We investigate the use of an atomic Fabry-Perot interferometer (FPI) with a pulsed non-interacting Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) source as a space-based acceleration sensor. We derive an analytic approximation for the device's transmission under a uniform acceleration, which we use to compute the device's attainable acceleration sensitivity using the classical Fisher information. In the ideal case of a high-finesse FPI and an infinitely narrow momentum width atomic source, we find that when the total length of the device is constrained to small values, the atomic FPI can achieve greater acceleration sensitivity than a Mach-Zender (MZ) interferometer of equivalent total device length. Under the more realistic case of a finite momentum width atomic source, We identify the ideal cavity length that gives the best sensitivity. Although the MZ interferometer now offers enhanced sensitivity within currently-achievable experimental parameter regimes, our analysis demonstrates that the atomic FPI holds potential as a promising alternative in the future, provided that narrow momentum width atomic sources can be engineered.

17 pages, 9 figures

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