Abstract

Most of the successful and efficient cooling schemes for neutral atoms which allows one to reach temperatures in the μK range rely on the ground state splitting of the atoms to be cooled. On the other hand, atoms without ground state splitting, e.g. alkaline earths, are of special interest for atom interferometry and frequency standards due to their small sensitivity to external fields and for BEC and the study of cold collisions due to the simplified theoretical interpretation of their interaction.

© 2000 IEEE