EXCITATION OF ONLY A SINGLE RECOIL COMPONENT IN OPTICAL RAMSEY INTERFEROMETRY USING CROSS-OVER RESONANCES

Optical Ramsey fringes have been observed in a configuration where the atomic wave function evolves in three different internal states. Beca use of selection rules only the interferometer leading to the high-fre quency recoil component can be formed. Using this method on cross-over resonances of the S-1(0)-P-3(1) magnesium intercombination transition fringes inherently free of the recoil splitting of saturation spectro scopy have been observed. Three-level Ramsey interferometry constitute s an attractive new scheme for high resolution spectroscopy and atom i nterferometry.