Waveguide atom beam splitter for laser-cooled neutral atoms

Abstract

A laser-cooled neutral-atom beam from a low-velocity intense source is split into two beams while it is guided by a magnetic-field potential. We generate our multimode beam-splitter potential with two current-carrying wires upon a glass substrate combined with an external transverse bias field. The atoms are guided around curves and a beam-splitter region within a 10-cm guide length. We achieve a maximum integrated flux of $1.5\times {10}^5 \mathrm{atoms}/\mathrm{s}$ with a current density of $5\times {10}^4 \mathrm{amp}/{\mathrm{cm}}^2$ in the $100‐\mathit{\mu }\mathrm{m}$-diameter wires. The initial beam can be split into two beams with a 50/50 splitting ratio.