Chasing accuracy in point source atom interferometry

Point source atom interferometry (PSI), enables one to extract rotation and acceleration from the spatial distribution of phase across an expanding gas of atoms, offering a path for high-stability rotation sensing in a compact volume with potential applications from inertial navigation to geoscience measurements. We present recent developments of our PSI gyroscope [1] where we study scale factor stability and scale factor bias in PSI that bound the accuracy that can be achieved in such interferometers. We show improvements in our long-term instability and progress toward accurate rotation rate and gyrocompass measurements in our compact system.

[1] Y.-J. Chen, A. Hansen, G. W. Hoth, E. Ivanov, B. Pelle, J. Kitching, and E. A. Donley, Single-Source Multiaxis Cold-Atom Interferometer in a Centimeter-Scale Cell, Phys. Rev. Applied 12, 014019 (2019).