Experiments with Supersonic Beams as a Source of Cold Atoms

Table of Contents
Acknowledgments v
Abstract ix
List of Tables xiv
List of Figures xv
Chapter 1. Introduction 1
1.1 Cooling an Effusive Beam . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.1.1 Laser Cooling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
1.1.2 Buffer-Gas Cooling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.2 Methods of Controlling Supersonic Beams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.3 Dissertation Outline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Chapter 2. An Overview of Supersonic Beams 7
2.1 Thermodynamics of Ideal Gases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.1.1 Steady State Gas Flow in 1D . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.1.2 Mach Number and Supersonic Beams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.1.3 Supersonic Beam Velocities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.2 The Supersonic Beam as a Bright General Source of Cold Atoms and
Molecules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.3 The Even-Lavie Nozzle for Generating Pulsed Beams . . . . . . . . . 16
Chapter 3. Slowing Supersonic Beams via Specular Reflection: The
Atomic Paddle 20
3.1 Using Helium for Atom Optics Experiments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
3.2 Reflecting Atoms from Surfaces: Atomic Mirrors . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
3.2.1 Crystal Choice: Si(111) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3.2.2 Crystal Preparation and Wet Etching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
3.2.3 Crystal Characterization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
3.3 The Experimental Apparatus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
3.3.1 The Vacuum System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
3.3.2 The Rotor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
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