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Simultaneous Magneto-Optical Trapping of a Boson-Fermion Mixture of Metastable Helium Atoms

2004; American Physical Society; Volume: 93; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1103/physrevlett.93.053001

1092-0145

R. J. W. Stas, John M. McNamara, W. Hogervorst, W. Vassen,

Atomic and Subatomic Physics Research

We simultaneously confine fermionic metastable 3He atoms and bosonic metastable 4He atoms in a magneto-optical trap. The trapped clouds, containing up to 1.5 x 10(8) atoms of each isotope, are characterized by measuring ions and metastable helium atoms escaping from the trap. Optical pumping of 3He atoms to a nontrapped hyperfine state is investigated and it is shown that large atom numbers can be confined without additional repumping lasers. Unique possibilities for quantum degeneracy experiments with mixtures of spin-polarized metastable 3He and 4He atoms are indicated.