Ultrastable Optical Clock with Neutral Atoms in an Engineered Light Shift Trap

Abstract

An ultrastable optical clock based on neutral atoms trapped in an optical lattice is proposed. Complete control over the light shift is achieved by employing the $5s^2{}^1{S}_0\to 5s5p{}^3{P}_0$ transition of ${}^{87}\mathrm{Sr}$ atoms as a "clock transition". Calculations of ac multipole polarizabilities and dipole hyperpolarizabilities for the clock transition indicate that the contribution of the higher-order light shifts can be reduced to less than 1 mHz, allowing for a projected accuracy of better than $10^{-17}$.

4 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. Lett