Radiation-pressure cooling of bound resonant absorbers

Abstract

We report the first observation of radiation-pressure cooling on a system of resonant absorbers which are elastically bound to a laboratory fixed apparatus. Mg ii ions confined in a Penning electromagnetic trap are cooled to <40 K by irradiating them with the 8-W output of a frequency doubled, single- mode dye laser tuned to the low- frequency side of the Doppler profile on the S122P322 (MJ=+12MJ=+32 or MJ=-12MJ=-32) transitions. Cooling to approximately 10-3 K should be possible. © 1978 The American Physical Society.