Kaewuam, Rattakorn; National Institute of Metrology (NIMT), Pathumthani, THAILAND
Phoonthong, Piyaphat; National Institute of Metrology (NIMT), Pathumthani, THAILAND
Mehlstäubler, Tanja E.; QUEST, FG 2, Quantenuhren und komplexe Systeme, PTB-Braunschweig; Leibniz Universität Hannover, Institut für Quantenoptik, Hannover, GERMANY; Leibniz Universität Hannover, Laboratorium für Nano- und Quantenengineering, Hannover, GERMANY
We report the coherent excitation of the highly forbidden 2𝑆1/2→2𝐹7/2 clock transition in the odd isotope 173Yb+ with nuclear spin 𝐼 =5/2 , and reveal the hyperfine-state-dependent, nuclear-spin–induced quenching of this transition. The inferred lifetime of the 𝐹𝑒 =4 hyperfine state is one order of magnitude shorter than the unperturbed 2𝐹7/2 clock state of 171Yb+. This reduced lifetime lowers the required optical power for coherent excitation of the clock transition, thereby reducing the ac Stark shift caused by the clock laser. Using a three-ion Coulomb crystal, we experimentally demonstrate an approximately twentyfold suppression of the ac Stark shift, a critical improvement for the scalability of future multi-ion Yb+ clocks. Furthermore, we report the |2𝑆1/2,𝐹𝑔=3⟩→|2𝐹7/2,𝐹𝑒=6⟩ unquenched reference transition frequency as 642.11917656354(43) THz, along with the measured hyperfine splitting and calculated quadratic Zeeman sensitivities of the 2𝐹7/2 clock state. Our results pave the way toward multi-ion optical clocks and quantum computers based on 173Yb+.
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CC BY 4.0 ; Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
Themenbereich der Metrologie
Zeit und Frequenz
Innovationscluster
Quantentechnologie
Geschäftsfelder
Grundlagen der Metrologie
Forschungsprojekt
We kindly acknowledge Thomas Legero, Erik Benkler, and Nils Huntemann for providing ultrastable laser light at 934 nm. We thank Christian Sanner, Wesley C. Campbell, Julian Berengut, Jacinda Ginges, Andrey Surzhykov, Jonas Keller, and Ingrid Richter for helpful discussions. This project has been supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) through grant CRC SFB 1227 (DQ-mat, project B03) and through Germany’s Excellence Strategy EXC-2123 QuantumFrontiers—390837967. We acknowledge support by the project 22IEM01 TOCK, which has received funding from the EMPIR programme cofinanced by the Participating States and from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. This work is also supported by funding support from the NSRF via the Program Management Unit for Human Resources and Institutional Development, Research and Innovation [Grant No. B39G680007] and Max-Planck-RIKEN-PTB-Center for Time, Constants and Fundamental Symmetries.
Zitierung
Yu, J., Prakash, A., Zyskind, C., Biswas, I. A., Kaewuam, R., Phoonthong, P., & Mehlstäubler, T. E. (2026). Nuclear spin quenching of the 2𝑆1/2→2𝐹7/2 electric octupole transition in 173Yb+. Physical Review Letters, 136(2), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1103/fx1b-5666
