Determination of the fine structure constant based on BLOCH oscillations of ultracold atoms in a vertical optical lattice.
We report an accurate measurement of the recoil velocity of 87Rb atoms based on Bloch oscillations in a vertical accelerated optical lattice. We transfer about 900 recoil momenta with an efficiency of 99.97% per recoil. A set of 72 measurements of the recoil velocity, each one with a relative uncertainty of about 33 ppb in 20 min integration time, leads to a determination of the fine structure constant with a statistical relative uncertainty of 4.4 ppb. The detailed analysis of the different systematic errors yields to a relative uncertainty of 6.7 ppb. The deduced value of alpha-1 is 137.035 998 78(91).
Laboratoire Kastler Brossel, Ecole Normale Supérieure, CNRS, UPMC, 4 place Jussieu, 75252 Paris Cedex 05, France.
Pierre
P
Cladé
Estefania
E
de Mirandes
Malo
M
Cadoret
Saïda
S
Guellati-Khélifa
Catherine
C
Schwob
François
F
Nez
Lucile
L
Julien
François
F
Biraben