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Affordable medium-finesse optical cavity for diode laser stabilization

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Abstract

We have constructed and characterized an affordable medium-finesse optical cavity \(({\mathcal {F}}\sim {1500})\) for the stabilization of tunable diode lasers at two different wavelengths (780, and \({960\,\textrm{nm}}\), respectively). Its main element is an ultra-low expansion glass spacer, whose temperature was stabilized using thermoelectric cooler elements inside a vacuum chamber. By combining the dual sideband technique and the classical Pound–Drever–Hall technique, we were able to lock the lasers at any frequency within the cavity free spectral range. The cavity presents a long-term drift of resonant frequency of \({1.2\,\mathrm{MHz/day}}\), which can be compensated for by temperature variation. Finally, we demonstrate the cavity use in an electromagnetically induced transparency microwave spectrum experiment in a thermal atomic sample.

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The experimental data are available from the authors upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by grants 2018/06835-0, 2019/23510-0, 2019/10971-0, 2021/04107-0, 2021/06371-7 and 2022/16904-5, São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP) and CNPq (305257/2022-6). It is also supported by the US Air Force Office of Scientific Research (Grant FA9550-20-1-0031) and the Army Research Office (Grant W911NF-21-1-0211).

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Author notes

  1. David Rodríguez Fernández, Manuel Alejandro Lefrán Torres, Marcos Roberto Cardoso, Jorge Douglas Massayuki Kondo, Mark Saffman and Luis Gustavo Marcassa contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Física de São Carlos, Universidade de São Paulo, Avenida Trabalhador São-Carlense, São Carlos, São Paulo, 13566-590, Brazil

    David Rodríguez Fernández, Manuel Alejandro Lefrán Torres, Marcos Roberto Cardoso & Luis Gustavo Marcassa

  2. Departamento de Física, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Rua Roberto Sampaio Gonzaga, Florianópolis, Santa Catarina, 88040-900, Brazil

    Jorge Douglas Massayuki Kondo

  3. Department of Physics, University of Wisconsin-Madison, University Avenue, Madison, WI, 53706-1390, USA

    Mark Saffman

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  1. David Rodríguez Fernández
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Correspondence to David Rodríguez Fernández.

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Fernández, D.R., Torres, M.A.L., Cardoso, M.R. et al. Affordable medium-finesse optical cavity for diode laser stabilization. Appl. Phys. B 130, 60 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00340-024-08190-4

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