A powerful tool of laboratory atomic physics — the ability to cool and trap atoms with lasers — may be headed for its first widespread practical application: measuring gravity for oil and geophysical exploration and submarine navigation.

References:

Snadden, M.J. . . . M.A. Kasevich. 1998. Measurement of the Earth’s gravity gradient with an atom interferometer-based gravity gradiometer. Physical Review Letters 81(Aug. 3):971.

Further Readings:

______. 1996. Viewing, jiggling a novel state of matter. Science News 149(May 25):327.

______. 1995. Atomic refraction: Bending matter waves. Science News 147(Feb. 25):116.

Perkins, S. 1997. Laser cooling yields Nobel in physics. Science News 152(Oct. 25):263.

Peterson, I. 1997. Atom laser demonstrated in chilled drips. Science News 151(Feb. 1):71.

Weiss, P. 1998. Hydrogen atoms chill to quantum sameness. Science News 154(July 25):54.

Sources:

Richard O. Hansen
Pearson, deRidder and Johnson, Inc.
12640 West Cedar Drive
Suite 100
Lakewood, CO 80228

Mark A. Kasevich
Yale University
Physics Department
New Haven, CT 06520

Steven L. Rolston
National Institute of Standards and Technology
PHY A167
Gaithersburg, MD 20899