Centre National De La Recherche Scientifique

Université De Franche Comte

Thales

Christophe Gorecki

Nicolas Passilly

Vincent Maurice

Rodolphe Boudot

Bernard Fouilland

Eric Kroemer

Ravinder Chutani

Device for shaping a laser beam for an atomic sensor, comprising a retroreflector prism with an entrance area, an exit area and two reflection surfaces forming a right angle therebetween. The device for shaping includes a linear polarizer disposed upstream from the entrance area of the retroreflector prism for linearly polarizing a laser beam entering into the retroreflector prism by the entrance area, and a form birefringence plate disposed downstream from the exit area of the retroreflector prism to circularly polarize a laser beam exiting from the retroreflector prism by the exit area.

Device for shaping a laser beam for an atomic sensor having retroreflector prism, linear polarizer, and form birefringence plate

The invention relates to a gas cell for an atomic sensor, comprising an optical cavity provided with at least one optical window () and fillable with a gas. The cell also comprises a sealing cup comprising a cavity mouth, a channel mouth, and a sealing access, as well as a membrane which hermetically closes the sealing access of the sealing cup. The membrane can be plastically deformed by heating so as to hermetically close the cavity mouth and/or the channel mouth, in such a way as to hermetically separate the optical cavity from the gas inflow channel.

Gas cell for an atomic sensor and method for filling a gas cell

The invention relates to a process for fabricating a microcell for a caesium atomic micro-clock having an inversion temperature above 80&#xb0; C., comprising a step of generating a caesium vapor by heating a caesium-containing pellet, the buffer gas used containing neon and helium.

Caesium atomic micro-clock microcell buffer gas mixture

The invention relates to an alkali-metal vapor cell, especially for an atomic clock, and to its manufacturing process. The alkali-metal vapor cell is able to be associated with a laser for emitting an external input laser beam and a photodetector for receiving an external output laser beam, and comprises a housing having an upstream optical window and a downstream optical window and forming an optical cavity filled with an alkali-metal vapor such as a caesium-comprising vapor, and micro-optical means arranged in the optical cavity and comprising an upstream optical reflector and a downstream optical reflector for reflecting the laser beam, which reflectors are inclined relative to each other, the upstream reflector being inclined relative to the plane (P) of the upstream window and to the axis of the input laser beam so that the external input laser beam passes through the upstream window in order to form an internal input laser beam, the latter being reflected by the upstream reflector and deviated towards the downstream reflector so as to form an internal intermediate laser beam that is reflected on the downstream reflector and deviated towards the downstream window so as to form an internal output laser beam, the internal output laser beam passing through the downstream window in order to form the external output laser beam.

Alkali-metal vapour cell, especially for an atomic clock, and manufacturing process

The sensor measures diffusion of a fluorescent marker in cavities. The sensor has a Mach-Zehnder micro-interferometer having a reference arm and a measurement arm. The reference arm has a deposit of a sensitive layer whose refractive index is modified when the sensitive layer is in contact with the fluorescent marker. In one embodiment, the micro-interferometer has a diode laser configured to generate a source beam, a substrate of silicon micro-machined with two Y junctions, where a first Y junction is configured to divide the source beam into a measurement beam along the measurement arm and a reference beam along the reference arm, a piezo-electric transducer configured to shift the frequency of the reference beam in phase by an acoustic modulation, wherein a second Y junction combines the measurement bean and the shifted reference beam to generate a combined beam; and a photo-detector configured to detect the combined beam. In one application, the sensor is used for in situ assessment of bronchial capillary permeability.

Growing community of inventors

Pin, France

Christophe Gorecki