Feature

Trapping Laser-cooled Atoms With Microwave Radiation

M. Reynolds, and I. Silvera, Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., and R. Spreeuw, C. Gerz, L Coldner, W. Phillips, S. Rolston, and C. Westbrook, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, Md.

A team of researchers from Harvard University and the National Institute of Standards and Technology recently demonstrated the trapping of laser-cooled neutral atoms by the force exerted on them by microwave radiation. Such trapping, first suggested a few years ago, is an attempt to address one of the obstacles to achieving Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) of an atomic gas.