BOULDER, Colo., Dec. 11 (UPI) -- U.S. government scientists say they have, for the first time, used mechanical motion to make atoms in a gas spin.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology researchers say the technique eventually might be used in high-performance magnetic sensors, power-efficient chip-scale atomic devices such as clocks, or serve as components for manipulating bits of information in quantum computers.
The NIST team said they used a vibrating microscale cantilever to drive magnetic oscillations in rubidium atoms. The scientists attached a tiny magnetic particle to the cantilever tip and applied electrical signals at the cantilever's "resonant" frequency to make the tip of the cantilever, and hence the magnetic particle, vibrate up and down. The vibrating particle in turn generated an oscillating magnetic field that impinged on atoms confined inside a 1-square-millimeter container nearby.
The electrons in the atoms, acting like tiny bar magnets with north and south poles, respond by rotating about a static magnetic field applied to the experimental set-up, causing the atoms to rotate like spinning tops that are wobbling slightly.
The research is described in the Dec. 1 issue of Physical Review Letters.
