Optical frequency standards based on the /sup 199/Hg/sup +/ ion

Author

Tanaka, U. ; Bergquist, J.C. ; Bize, S. ; Diddams, S.A. ; Drullinger, R.E. ; Hollberg, L. ; Itano, W.M. ; Tanner, C.E. ; Wineland, D.J.

Author_Institution

Commun. Res. Lab., Kobe, Japan

Volume

52

Issue

2

fYear

2003

fDate

4/1/2003 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

245

Lastpage

249

Abstract

We report on work directed toward the systematic evaluation of an optical frequency standard based on the /sup 2/S/sub 1/2/-/sup 2/D/sub 5/2/ transition of a single, laser-cooled, trapped /sup 199/Hg/sup +/ ion, whose resonance frequency is 1.06/spl times/10/sup 15/ Hz. For the purpose of the evaluation, a second /sup 199/Hg/sup +/ standard has been constructed. In the cooling-laser system built for the second standard, an injection-locking scheme has been applied to a CW Ti-sapphire laser. We also report optical frequency measurements of the clock transition performed over the past 21 months with the first standard. During this term, the variation of the clock transition frequency is found to be less than /spl plusmn/1/spl times/10/sup -14/.

Keywords

atomic clocks; frequency standards; laser cooling; laser mode locking; mercury (metal); CW Ti-sapphire laser injection-locking scheme; Hg; TiAl/sub 2/O/sub 3/; clock transition frequency variation; clock transition optical frequency measurements; cooling-laser systems; injection-locked lasers; ion resonance frequency; mercury ion optical frequency standards; optical atomic clocks; single laser-cooled trapped Hg ion transitions; Charge carrier processes; Clocks; Frequency measurement; Laser transitions; Measurement standards; Mercury (metals); Particle beam optics; Performance evaluation; Resonance; Resonant frequency;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Instrumentation and Measurement, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9456

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TIM.2003.810008

Filename

1202021