Studying the behavior of atoms in external electromagnetic fields is an excellent way of probing fundamental physics with a tabletop experiment. Experiments are underway in our group that will test (and search for possible extensions to) various aspects of the Standard Model:
In addition, the spectroscopic information and technologies connected with these measurements are interesting in their own right. Spectroscopic measurements performed by our group include
Technologies developed in the course of our work include
And of course we have to have some recreational activity, including
This atomic beam experiment, headed by A.-T. Nugyen, searches for parity violation in a pair of nearly-degenerate opposite parity levels in Dy. The experiment is currently being upgraded to employ cw rather than pulsed lasers. Adiabatic fast passage is used to efficiently excite the entire Doppler distribution. The new experiment should be 100 times more sensitive than the previous version.
Grace Chern's Undergraduate Award Presentation slides, DAMOP-2000, G. Chern's Thesis
This research is carried out in collaboration with the Weak Interactions Group of Professor Stuart Freedman. We are currently working on an atomic beam version of the experiment and are also looking into possibilities of doing a vapor cell experiment.
The PNC experiments in Yb were proposed by David DeMille (Phys. Rev. Lett. 74, 4165 (1995)). Preliminary work on Yb lifetimes was reported in: C.J. Bowers, et. al., Phys. Rev. A 53 (5), 3103(1996) and C.J.Bowers, D. Budker, D. DeMille, S.J. Freedman, G.Gwinner, and J.E.Stalnaker, Experimental investigation of the 6s2 1S0->5d6s 3D1,2 forbidden transitions in atomic ytterbium (LBNL Preprint 42454); Phys. Rev. A. 59(5), May (1999); this paper is also posted at the APS E-print archive. Isotope shift, hyperfine structure, and Stark-induced amplitude measurements are described in C. J. Bowers' Ph.D. thesis (Berkeley, 1998); M1 measurements are described in Jason Stalnaker's undergraduate honors Thesis (Berkeley, 1998). Current participants in this work include:
Beam Experiment: Jason Stalnaker and Valeriy Yashchuk (click here for PDF file with poster), C. J. Bowers' Thesis, J. Stalnaker's Thesis
Cell Experiment: Derek Kimball and Brian DeBoo (poster, D. F. Kimball's Thesis)
our publications on Bose violation by photons
Lifetimes, electric polarizabilities and search for new energy levels in samarium (poster, S. Rochester's Thesis)
our publications on spectroscopy of Sm
our publications on spectroscopy of Yb
our publications on spectroscopy of Dy
our publications on magneto-optics
our publications on electro-optics
our publications on self-rotation
our publications on the variable FSR Fabry-Perot
our publication on solidification