Experimental system for research on ultracold atomic gases near superconducting microstructures

Abstract

We describe an experimental system that integrates the techniques for producing ultracold atomic gases with the techniques for cooling solid bodies to cryogenic temperatures. Ultracold clouds of 87 Rb are prepared in a trap setup based on room-temperature coils and subsequently transported to a superconducting microstructure by means of optical tweezers. The superconducting microstructure generates a magnetic microtrap and is cooled by a helium-flow cryostat that can achieve temperatures down to 2 K. Both the room-temperature trap setup and the superconducting microtrap are installed in the same ultra-high-vacuum chamber. The presented system is well suited to create hybrid quantum systems by combining ultracold atomic gases and superconducting devices.