Laser Cooling
A technique using laser light to slow atoms down, cooling them to temperatures within millionths of a degree above absolute zero. Essential for neutral atom and trapped ion quantum computers.
Laser cooling uses precisely tuned laser beams to slow atoms down, reducing their kinetic energy and thus their temperature. When an atom moving toward a laser beam absorbs a photon, it is slowed slightly. By arranging multiple laser beams, atoms can be cooled in all directions simultaneously.
The technique can cool atoms to temperatures in the microkelvin (millionths of a Kelvin) range, which is required for both neutral atom and trapped ion quantum computing. At these temperatures, atoms move slowly enough to be trapped and manipulated with additional laser beams.
Laser cooling was developed in the 1980s, with foundational work by Steven Chu, Claude Cohen-Tannoudji, and William Phillips, who shared the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics. NIST Boulder was a primary site for this research.
NIST Boulder was one of the primary labs developing laser cooling techniques in the 1980s and 1990s. This foundational work is the direct technical precursor to every neutral atom and trapped ion quantum computer being built today in Colorado.