Stochastic dynamics of the magneto-optical trap

Deterministic instabilities in the magneto-optical trap

The cloud of cold atoms obtained from a magneto-optical trap is known to exhibit two types of instabilities in the regime of high atomic densities: stochastic instabilities and deterministic instabilities. In the present paper, the experimentally observed deterministic dynamics is described extensively. Three different behaviors are distinguished. All are cyclic, but not necessarily periodic. I...

Bose-Einstein Condensation with High Atom Number in a Deep Magnetic Trap

Cover: Photos of the magnetic trap (by Henk Neerings) with an image of a Bose-Einstein condensate. 4 Two-dimensional magneto-optical trap as a source of slow atoms 41 4. 5 Magneto-optical trap with high atom number 53 5.

Dynamics in a Two-Level Atom Magneto-Optical Trap

A magneto-optical trap loaded from a pyramidal funnel.

We have demonstrated the transfer of 39 K and 40 K atoms from a magneto-optical funnel (a hollow pyramidal mirror) through a low (0:05 l/s) conductance hole and into a conventional magneto-optical trap (mot) 35 cm away, with an efficiency of approximately six percent. This simple scheme should be useful for experiments requiring high loading rates with minimal contamination from hot untrapped a...

Photoassociation inside an optical dipole trap: absolute rate coefficients and Franck-Condon factors

We present quantitative measurements of the photoassociation of cesium molecules inside a far-detuned optical dipole trap. A model of the trap depletion dynamics is derived which allows to extract absolute photoassociation rate coefficients for the initial single-photon photoassociation step from measured trap-loss spectra. The sensitivity of this approach is demonstrated by measuring the Franc...