Continuous loading of a non-dissipative atom trap

Laboratoire Kastler Brossel - 24 rue Lhomond, F-75231 Paris Cedex 05, France

Received: 3 July 2002
Accepted: 4 November 2002

Abstract

We study theoretically a scheme in which particles from an incident beam are trapped in a potential well when colliding with particles already present in the well. The balance between the arrival of new particles and the evaporation of particles from the trapped cloud leads to a steady state that we characterize in terms of particle number and temperature. This scheme is particularly interesting for a cigar-shaped potential where different longitudinal and transverse evaporation thresholds can be chosen. We show that a resonance occurs when the transverse evaporation threshold coincides with the energy of the incident particles. It leads to a dramatic increase in phase space density with respect to the incident beam.