PreprintCC BY 4.0arXiv
A low-volume cold-atom microwave clock with an additively manufactured cavity
Abstract
We present the performance of a compact microwave interrogated atomic clock based on laser cooled 87Rb atoms. The clock utilizes a micro-fabricated grating magneto-optical trap (gMOT) to cool and trap atoms, and an additively manufactured microwave cavity for microwave interrogation. We demonstrate a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of $370$ at a 1 Hz bandwidth and mid-term instability of 6.7×10−14 at an averaging time of τ=3 × 104 s. In addition, a low cost mu-metal foil has been implemented on the vacuum chamber to reduce the quadratic Zeeman shift which was previously limiting stability beyond τ= 10 s.
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BibTeX
@misc{smith2026lowvolume,
title = {{A low-volume cold-atom microwave clock with an additively manufactured cavity}},
author = {Samuel A. Smith and Sean Dyer and Alan Bregazzi and Rajnandan Choudhury Das and Oliver S. Burrow and Christoph Affolderbach and Gaetano Mileti and Erling Riis and Paul F. Griffin},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2610.35588},
eprint = {2610.35588},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.35588},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - A low-volume cold-atom microwave clock with an additively manufactured cavity
AU - Samuel A. Smith
AU - Sean Dyer
AU - Alan Bregazzi
AU - Rajnandan Choudhury Das
AU - Oliver S. Burrow
AU - Christoph Affolderbach
AU - Gaetano Mileti
AU - Erling Riis
AU - Paul F. Griffin
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/26
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2610.35588
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.35588
AB - We present the performance of a compact microwave interrogated atomic clock based on laser cooled ^87Rb atoms. The clock utilizes a micro-fabricated grating magneto-optical trap (gMOT) to cool and trap atoms, and an additively manufactured microwave cavity for microwave interrogation. We demonstrate a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of $370$ at a 1 Hz bandwidth and mid-term instability of 6.7×10^−14 at an averaging time of τ=3 × 10^4 s. In addition, a low cost mu-metal foil has been implemented on the vacuum chamber to reduce the quadratic Zeeman shift which was previously limiting stability beyond τ= 10 s.
ER -