A multi-band atomic candle with microwave-dressed Rydberg atoms

Stabilizing important physical quantities to atom-based standards lies at the heart of modern atomic, molecular and optical physics, and is widely applied to the field of precision metrology. Of particular importance is the atom-based microwave field amplitude stabilizer, the so-called atomic candle. Previous atomic candles are realized with atoms in their ground state, and hence suffer from the lack of frequency band tenability and small stabilization bandwidth, severely limiting their development and potential applications. To tackle these limitations, we employ microwave-dressed Rydberg atoms to realize a novel atomic candle that features multi-band frequency tunability and large stabilization bandwidth. We demonstrate amplitude stabilization of microwave field from C-band to Ka-band, which could be extended to quasi-DC and terahertz fields by exploring abundant Rydberg levels. Our atomic candle achieves stabilization bandwidth of too Hz, outperforming previous ones by more than two orders of magnitude. Our simulation indicates the stabilization bandwidth can be further increased up to mo kHz. Our work paves a route to develop novel electric field control and applications with a noise-resilient, miniaturized, sensitive and broadband atomic candle.

Automated summary

This study demonstrates a novel atom-based microwave field amplitude stabilizer using microwave-dressed Rydberg atoms, which features multi-band frequency tunability and large stabilization bandwidth. The stabilization bandwidth achieved is two orders of magnitude higher than previous methods and can potentially be further increased. This research paves the way for developing noise-resilient, miniaturized, sensitive, and broadband electric field control and applications.