Abstract

A large-aperture liquid-He coated spherical mirror and a room-temperature bent-gold crystal have been used to focus atom beams of H and He, respectively. They are described elsewhere in this symposium. Many of the new optical elements for atoms rely on the mechanical forces of light; mirrors are one example. When atoms approach the surface of glass that has intense blue-detuned light inside, they recoil from the evanescent wave that extends several wavelengths past the surface and into the vacuum. The atoms are never close enough to the surface to be affected by its atomic attraction or its small-scale irregularities. When a highly collimated beam of sodium atoms is directed at a standing wave of light near its resonance frequency, the angular scattering pattern of the atoms exhibits the characteristics of diffraction from a short sinusoidal grating. Diffraction orders up to ~20 have been observed at high light intensities. In contrast to phase gratings made with light, material absorption gratings are amplitude gratings.

© 1990 Optical Society of America