Direct excitation of the forbidden clock transition in neutral 174Yb atoms confined to an optical lattice

We report direct single-laser excitation of the strictly forbidden (6s^2)^1S_0 -(6s6p)^3P_0 clock transition in the even 174Yb isotope confined to a 1D optical lattice. A small (~1.2 mT) static magnetic field was used to induce a nonzero electric dipole transition probability between the clock state...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inarXiv.org
Main Authors Barber, Zeb W, Hoyt, Chad W, Oates, Chris W, Hollberg, Leo, Taichenachev, Aleksei V, Yudin, Valera I
Format Paper
LanguageEnglish
Published Ithaca Cornell University Library, arXiv.org 02.03.2006
Subjects
Alternating current
Calcium
Clocks
Electric dipoles
Excitation
Magnesium
Optical lattices
Q factors
Transition probabilities
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Summary:We report direct single-laser excitation of the strictly forbidden (6s^2)^1S_0 -(6s6p)^3P_0 clock transition in the even 174Yb isotope confined to a 1D optical lattice. A small (~1.2 mT) static magnetic field was used to induce a nonzero electric dipole transition probability between the clock states at 578.42 nm. Narrow resonance linewidths of 20 Hz (FHWM) with high contrast were observed, demonstrating a record neutral-atom resonance quality factor of 2.6x10^13. The previously unknown ac Stark shift-canceling (magic) wavelength was determined to be 759.35+/-0.02 nm. This method for using the metrologically superior even isotope can be easily implemented in current Yb and Sr lattice clocks, and can create new clock possibilities in other alkaline earth-like atoms such as Mg and Ca.
ISSN:2331-8422
DOI:10.48550/arxiv.0512084