Cold atomic beam produced by a conical mirror funnel - art. no. 013402

We have obtained and characterized a cold atomic beam produced by a simple conical atom funnel, which consists of a conical hollow mirror (axicon) wit h a small hole at the apex and a single incident laser beam. Atoms trapped in the axicon mirror are ejected by the radiation-pressure imbalance along the extraction column. The atomic beam has a longitudinal velocity in the r ange of 4 to 6 m/s, a divergence of 150 mad, and a maximum instantaneous Au x of 2.2 x 10(10) atoms/s in a pulsed operation. The experimental results a re in quantitative agreement with the numerical simulations. A continuous a tomic beam is also possible with an apex hole smaller than the trapped atom ic cloud.