Quantum Institute: Visitor Schedule

The Quantum Lunch is regularly held on Thursdays in the Theoretical Division Conference Room, TA-3, Building 123, Room 121.
For more information, contact Diego Dalvit.

May 2, 2006
2:00 - 3:00 PM, Tuesday

Peter Schwindt,
National Institute of Standards and Technology

Chip-Scale Automic Magnetometers

Abstract

At the National Institute of Standards and Technology we are working to drastically miniaturize vapor-cell-based atomic devices by taking advantage of the techniques of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). MEMS fabrication allows the size of these devices to be scaled down to millimeters and below. With the reduction in size comes a reduction in power consumption allowing the physics package to operate with less than 100 mW. The use of MEMS also offers the potential for wafer-level fabrication, allowing high-volume, low-cost manufacturing of the devices. To date, we have demonstrated chip-scale atomic clocks and chip-scale atomic magnetometers (CSAMs) with physic package sizes less than 12 mm³ corresponding to reduction in volume over the previous state of the art by more than a factor of 1,000. The CSAM could find applications ranging from mineral and oil exploration to remote sensing and with improved sensitivity could be used in human magnetocardiography. Large scale atomic magnetometers are known for their high accuracy, total field sensitivity, and relatively low power consumption. The CSAM retains these favorable attributes in a very small, low-power package. We have demonstrated a CSAM with a sensitivity of 50 pT / Hz1/2, and our current work focuses on improving the sensitivity of the CSAM to 1 pT / Hz1/2 and below, broadening the bandwidth, and reducing the power consumption.