Abstract

An atom moving in a strong standing wave radiation field may be translationally cooled by the induced or dipole force.¹ The dipole force is proportional to I^1/2, where I is the laser intensity, whereas the Doppler (usual) cooling force saturates with increasing I. Since laser sources can provide intensities which are much greater than the saturation intensities of many atomic transitions, cooling via the dipole force can be much more efficient than Doppler cooling. The dipole force has been used to cool the transverse^2,3 and the longitudinal⁴ velocities of atoms in an atomic beam.

© 1990 Optical Society of America