Abstract
We present the experimental realization of a compressible blue-detuned crossed dipole trap for cold atoms allowing for fast dynamical compression (5–10 ms) of rubidium atoms up to densities of . The dipole trap consists of two intersecting tubes of blue-detuned laser light. These tubes are formed using a single, rapidly rotating laser beam which, for sufficiently fast rotation frequencies, can be accurately described by a quasistatic potential. The atomic cloud is compressed by dynamically reducing the trap volume, leading to densities close to the Ioffe-Regel criterion for light localization.
8 More- Received 4 July 2012
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.86.053412
©2012 American Physical Society