Resolved sideband cooling

Resolved sideband cooling removes motional quanta by selectively driving a red motional sideband and then resetting the internal quantum state through spontaneous emission or optical pumping. Spectral resolution requires the effective cooling-transition width smaller than the motional angular frequency in the same units. A narrow Raman transition can meet that requirement even when the optical transition used for Doppler cooling is broad.

The reset is essential: the coherent red motional sideband merely exchanges internal and motional excitation reversibly. To see the distinction, an ideal pulse sends $|g,1⟩$ to $-i|e,0⟩$; the same interaction can send it back. An ideal dissipative reset instead takes $|e,0⟩$ to $|g,0⟩$, with information and energy carried into the environment. Repeating this cycle accumulates population near the motional ground state. Recoil during the reset can add motion, and off-resonant excitation can disturb $|g,0⟩$; neither is included in the ideal pulse below.

In 1995, Christopher Monroe and collaborators cooled one ${}^9{\mathrm{Be}}^{+}$ ion in a ring/endcap Paul trap. They used $313\mathrm{nm}$ Doppler cooling and optical pumping into $|F,m_F⟩=|2,2⟩$. Red-sideband Raman transitions transferred population to $|1,1⟩$, followed by dissipative recycling. Repeating across three directions yielded a reported three-dimensional ground state population of about $92\%$.^[ref]

A variable-frequency Raman transition probe, an exchange pulse and a cycling detection beam converted state populations into fluorescence collected through $f/2$ optics onto a position-sensitive photomultiplier. Red/blue asymmetry inferred motional occupation; varying probe duration tested the thermal assumption. Off-resonant processes and independently observed heating limited cooling.^[ref]