Abstract
We report the first observation of coherent backscattering of light from a sample of laser-cooled atoms. Rubidium 85 atoms are captured from a room-temperature vapor in a magneto-optical trap, and illuminated with a laser probe. The angular intensity distribution of the backscattered light is recorded on a cooled CCD detector. We observe a small enhancement factor in all polarization channels, including the “helicity preserving” channel where the enhancement is only 1.08. This surprising observation is attributed to the existence of contrast reduction processes involving the atom’s internal structure.
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Labeyrie, G., de Tomasi, F., Bernard, JC., Mueller, C., Miniatura, C., Kaiser, R. (2001). Coherent Backscattering of Light from a Cold Atomic Cloud. In: Kaiser, R., Westbrook, C., David, F. (eds) Coherent atomic matter waves. Les Houches - Ecole d’Ete de Physique Theorique, vol 72. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-45338-5_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-45338-5_11
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