Abstract
We have recently reported laser cooling of sodium atoms to temperatures as low as 40 μK,1 significantly below the limit for Doppler cooling, which is 240 μK in this case. Inasmuch as no mechanisms for cooling below the Doppler limit were designed into the experiments, the Doppler limit was expected to hold, and this result was rather surprising. Further experimental and theoretical investigations by several groups have now begun to elucidate the cooling mechanisms involved in this new kind of cooling.
© 1989 Optical Society of America
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