Atom-Based Electromagnetic Radiation Electric-Field Sensor

• Main Authors: GORDON Joshua, THAICHAROEN Nithiwadee, HOLLOWAY Christopher, ANDERSON David A, MILLER Stephanie A, JEFFERTS Steven, RAITHEL Georg A, SCHWARZKOPF Andrew
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 15.12.2016
• Subjects: MEASURING; MEASURING ELECTRIC VARIABLES; MEASURING MAGNETIC VARIABLES; PHYSICS; TESTING

A method is presented for measuring the electric field of electromagnetic radiation using the spectroscopic responses of Rydberg atoms to the electromagnetic radiation field. The method entails implementing quantitative models of the Rydberg atom response to the electromagnetic radiation field to provide predetermined atomic properties or spectra for field amplitudes and or frequencies of interest, spectroscopically measuring the response (spectrum) of Rydberg atoms exposed to an unknown electromagnetic radiation field, and obtaining the electric field amplitude and/or frequency of the unknown electromagnetic radiation by using features extracted from the measured spectrum and comparing them to features in a predetermined spectrum among the set of predetermined spectra.