Hexapole-compensated magneto-optical trap on a mesoscopic atom chip

Abstract

Magneto-optical traps on atom chips are usually restricted to small atomic samples due to a limited capture volume caused primarily by distorted field configurations. Here we present a magneto-optical trap based on a millimeter-sized wire structure which generates a magnetic field with minimized distortions. Together with the loading from a high-flux two-dimensional magneto-optical trap, we achieve a loading rate of 8.4 x 10(10) atoms/s and maximum number of 8.7 x 10(9) captured atoms. The wire structure is placed outside of the vacuum to enable a further adaptation to new scientific objectives. Since all magnetic fields are applied locally without the need for external bias fields, the presented setup will facilitate parallel generation of Bose-Einstein condensates on a conveyor belt with a cycle rate above 1 Hz.