Proposal for atom traps with low power by surface plasmon polaritons on the short waveguide
Aiping Liu, Zhanfei Kang, Tong Wang, Pengfei Zhang, Xi‐Feng Ren, Chang‐Ling Zou, Qin Wang · Physical Review A · 2024
In this study, a viable platform for atom traps using a dielectric-loaded surface-plasmon-polariton waveguide is proposed. A trap depth of 0.239 mK can be achieved above a ${\mathrm{SiO}}_{2}$ waveguide on an Au-${\mathrm{SiO}}_{2}$ substrate, with mode powers of $0.5\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mW}$ for the blue-detuned ${\mathrm{TM}}_{0}$ mode, $0.1\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mW}$ for the ${\mathrm{TM}}_{1}$ mode, and $0.55\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mW}$ for the red-detuned ${\mathrm{TM}}_{0}$ mode. The trap center is about 180 nm above the waveguide surface, and the corresponding cooperativity parameter for coupling the $^{87}\mathrm{Rb}$ atom with a guided photon is about 0.137. By controlling the phase difference between counterpropagating red-detuned ${\mathrm{TM}}_{0}$ modes, atoms can be delivered along the waveguide by an optical conveyor belt. Compared to the dielectric waveguide without the enhancement of surface plasmon polaritons, our scheme has the advantage of forming a trap depth with low-power requirements and stronger atom-photon interactions, which makes it highly suitable for applications in photonic-atomic chips.