Abstract

The light pressure that results from the transfer of a momentum hk/2π to an atomic particle in the resonant scattering of photons has been studied thoroughly and is widely used to control the motion of atoms, to reduce their kinetic energy, corresponding to temperatures in the range below 1 mK and to reach in future the ultimate frequency standard. For a traveling plane wave the momentum of an atom can be changed significantly only if the interaction of the atom with a laser field can be made cyclic. This is possible if there is a transition from a ground (or metastable) state to a short lived level that decays spontaneously to the lower state. For this case the maximum force is determined by the rate 2γ of the spontaneous decay and is given by F_max = hkγ/ 2π.

© 1994 Optical Society of America