About Quantum Control
In 2007, I finished my PhD studentship at the University of Southampton, in the School of Physics and Astronomy. I worked as the very first student of the newly formed "Quantum Control" group. My project was to assemble, test and characterise a Magneto Optical Trap (MOT) system for experiments looking into coherent techniques for optically cooling and manipulating atoms with a view to extending these techniques to work with molecules. This work was done under the supervision of Dr. Tim Freegarde and funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).
There are three main areas: the laser diodes we custom built and work with, the Rubidium MOT - which is the centre piece - and the vapour cell for initial two-photon experiments where we test our chirped pulsed laser system.
We work with atomic Rubidium and in particular, the Rubidium-85 D2 line which is at 780 nm.
Diode lasers are readily available at this wave-length. We have a collection of home-built 120 mW, c.w. external cavity (grating feedback) diode lasers that are used for the MOT trapping and repump beams.
We also have a powerful, 1 W commercial diode laser (Sacher 'Tiger', also at 780 nm) at the heart of our chirped-pulse system for the electronic and momentum state manipulation of Rubidium in the MOT and the vapour cell.
The centre-piece of our apparatus is the Rubidium Magneto-Optical Trap.
This is a beautifully designed vacuum chamber that is used to create clouds of cold atoms for us to play with. It is the first (and currently only) cold atom experiment at the University of Southampton.
The large windows and optics allows large diameter trapping beams and a large trapped Rubidium cloud at micro-Kelvin temperatures upon which we can perform experiments using the chirped-pulsed (Tiger) laser system.
We have a long (20 cm) Rubidium vapour cell. We use this cell to investigate atomic coherence times and to test and optimise our chirped-pulsed system.
Using a combination of Acousto-Optic and Electro-Optic modulators, we can take the c.w. beam from our Tiger laser and generate a train of pulses that can be programmed in both amplitude and frequency.
We have control on the micro second time-scale, which is within the coherence time of Rubidium atoms in our vapour cell at room temperature.
- EPSRC website
- Quantum Control website
- School of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Southampton
CVCP Laser Safety Booklet
Anyone that works with lasers in the UK will know about the CVCP Laser Safety Guidelines booklet. It is required reading for students though perversely, is almost impossible to find anywhere. It is also rather dated.
If you do not have this booklet and need it to begin working with lasers, then you can download a PDF copy here 
Quantum Control Bibliography
There is an online Bibliography for the Quantum Control group which can be found here
It contains hundreds of publications about laser cooling, atomic traps and manipulation as well as some key historic papers. This bibliography is used by the group as an essential reference store and most items have full text abstracts with web and DOI links to the full PDF paper (Journal subscription may be required).
Note: Currently the bibliography is displayed as one large list, which may take some time to load over slower connections.
More information
More information about our research, including detailed descriptions of parts of the experiment, papers, and group members can be found on the Quantum Control website, here