PHYSICAL REVIEW FOCUS 12 March 2008 http://focus.aps.org/

PHYSICAL REVIEW FOCUS 12 March 2008 http://focus.aps.org/
David Ehrenstein, American Physical Society

Introductions to the Focus stories of the past week;
visit http://focus.aps.org for the complete stories.

STOPPING AND FREEZING A BULLET
The cooling of atoms to near absolute zero has been possible
thanks largely to laser-based techniques, but only about 10
percent of elements in the periodic table have the necessary
atomic level structure. A new two-step technique, described
in two back-to-back papers in the 7 March Physical Review
Letters, promises to cool atoms representing 90 percent of
the elements. As a demonstration, the researchers slowed
a beam of atoms with a magnetic braking system, and
then--working with a separate sample--showed how to cool
the atoms further in the process of switching them from one
trap to another. Although the steps have yet to be combined,
the team believes their method could cool atoms like hydrogen
that have proven difficult to work with using traditional means.
(Edvardas Narevicius et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 100, 093003,
and Gabriel N. Price et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 100, 093004)
Links to the papers: http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v100/e093003
and http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v100/e093004
COMPLETE Focus story at http://focus.aps.org/story/v21/st9

***

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