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Letter

Nature Physics 5, 551–554 (1 August 2009) | doi:10.1038/nphys1311

Stylus ion trap for enhanced access and sensing

Robert Maiwald , Dietrich Leibfried , Joe Britton , James C. Bergquist , Gerd Leuchs & David J. Wineland

Small, controllable, highly accessible quantum systems can serve as probes at the single-quantum level to study a number of physical effects, for example in quantum optics or for electric- and magnetic-field sensing. The applicability of trapped atomic ions as probes is highly dependent on the measurement situation at hand and thus calls for specialized traps.