Laser frequency offset locking scheme for high-field imaging of cold atoms

GRACIANA PUENTES

APPLIED PHYSICS B - LASERS AND OPTICS

SPRINGER

Lugar: Berlin; Año: 2012 p. 1 - 6

0946-2171

We present a simple and flexible frequency offset locking scheme developed for high-field imaging of ultra- cold atoms which relies on commercially available RF elec- tronics only. The main new ingredient is the use of the sharp amplitude response of a ?home-made? RF filter to provide an error signal for locking the lasers. We were able to offset lock two independent diode lasers within a capture range of hundreds of MHz, and with a tuning range of up to 1.4 GHz. The beat-note residual fluctuations for offset locked lasers are below 2 MHz for integration times of several hundreds of seconds.