Closed-Loop Dual-Atom-Interferometer Inertial Sensor with Continuous Cold Atomic Beams

Abstract

We demonstrate a closed-loop light-pulse atom interferometer inertial sensor that can realize continuous decoupled measurements of acceleration and rotation rate. The sensor operates with double-loop atom interferometers, which share the same Raman light pulses in a spatially separated Mach-Zehnder configuration and use continuous cold atomic beams propagating in opposite directions from two 2D$^+$ magneto-optical trappings. Acceleration and the rotation rate are decoupled and simultaneously measured by the sum and difference of dual atom-interferometer signals, respectively. The sensitivities of inertial measurements are also increased to be approximately 1.86 times higher than that of a single atom interferometer. The acceleration phase shift is compensated in real time by phase-locking these interferometers via the Raman laser phases from the sum interferometer signal, and the gyroscope perfomance is improved. We achieve long-term stabilities of $6.1 \ \mu g$ and 840 nrad/s for the acceleration and the rotation rate, respectively, using a short interrogation time of 0.87ms (interference area $A=0.097$ mm$^2$). This work provides a building block for an atomic interferometer based inertial measurement unit for use in field applications that require a high data-rate and high stability.