Atom Interferometry - AION
We are part of the AION collaboration that is developing a new experimental platform to perform interferometry with ultracold strontium atoms. In close collaboration with other UK universities, we will use the strontium clock transition to perform high-resolution interferometry on atoms in free flight. The long-term goals of this project include detection of mid-frequency gravitational waves, ultra-light dark matter, and other tests of fundamental physics, see:
AION: An Atom Interferometer Observatory and Network
L. Badurina et al. (AION Collaboration)
JCAP 05(2020), 011 (2020)
In atom interferometry, a cloud of ultracold atoms is separated and the two components allowed to separately evolve before being recombined. Information on the difference in phase accumulated along each path is obtained from the resulting interference. This phase evolution is highly sensitive to small forces and changes in atomic transition frequencies, leading to established applications in gravimetry, inertial sensing and metrology. An emerging application of atom interferometry is to detection problems in astrophysics, cosmology and high energy physics.
Within Cambridge, we are working closely together with our collegues from the high energy group (https://www.hep.phy.cam.ac.uk/AION).