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High-resolution adaptive imaging of a single atom

Nature Photonics volume 10, pages 606–610 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

Optical imaging systems are used extensively in the life and physical sciences because of their ability to non-invasively capture details on the microscopic and nanoscopic scales. Such systems are often limited by source or detector noise, image distortions and human operator misjudgement. Here, we report a general, quantitative method to analyse and correct these errors. We use this method to identify and correct optical aberrations in an imaging system for single atoms and realize an atomic position sensitivity of ∼0.5 nm Hz−1/2 with a minimum uncertainty of 1.7 nm, allowing the direct imaging of atomic motion. This is the highest position sensitivity ever measured for an isolated atom and opens up the possibility of performing out-of-focus three-dimensional particle tracking, imaging of atoms in three-dimensional optical lattices or sensing forces at the yoctonewton (10−24 N) scale.

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Figure 1: Schematic of the imaging system.
Figure 2: Aberration retrieval results.
Figure 3: Measured position uncertainty δx of the trapped ion centroid position versus image integration time τ.
Figure 4: Micromotion position measurement.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the US Army Research Office (ARO) with funds from the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) Multi-Qubit Coherent Operations (MQCO) Program and the ARO Atomic and Molecular Physics Program, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) Multidisciplinary Research Program of the University Research Initiative (MURI) on Quantum Measurement and Verification, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Quiness Program, the Army Research Laboratory Center for Distributed Quantum Information, the National Science Foundation (NSF) Physics Frontier Center at the Joint Quantum Institute (JQI) and the NSF Physics at the Information Frontier Program. The authors also acknowledge support from the Imaging Core at the University of Maryland.

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  1. and Department of Physics, Joint Quantum Institute, Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer Science, University of Maryland, College Park, 20742, Maryland, USA

    J. D. Wong-Campos, K. G. Johnson, B. Neyenhuis, J. Mizrahi & C. Monroe

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  1. J. D. Wong-Campos
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  2. K. G. Johnson
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the design, construction and carrying out of the experiment, discussed the results and commented on the manuscript. J.D.W.-C. and K.G.J. analysed the data and performed the simulations. J.D.W.-C., K.G.J. and C.M. wrote the manuscript. B.N. and J.M. contributed equally to both the design and construction of the experiment.

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Correspondence to J. D. Wong-Campos.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Wong-Campos, J., Johnson, K., Neyenhuis, B. et al. High-resolution adaptive imaging of a single atom. Nature Photon 10, 606–610 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2016.136

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