Abstract

We have designed a gravitational cavity for ultracold atoms using an atomic mirror made from an evanescent laser wave. We have observed multiple bounces showing thus the stability of the cavity.¹ By a temporal variation of the evanescent wave intensity, we have realized various atom optics components: lenses,² temporal slits,³ phase modulators.⁴ We have shown that a suitable use of spontaneous emission processes allows to introduce an efficient cooling mechanism during the bounce of the atoms onto the mirror.⁵ We have also designed an atomic interferometer using this cavity,³ which proves that the coherence of the de Rro-glie waves can be preserved during the bounce.

© 1997 Optical Society of America