Measurement of the electric polarizability of lithium by atom interferometry

摘要: We have built an atom interferometer and, by applying electric field on one of the two interfering beams, we measured static polarizability lithium {alpha}=(24.33{+-}0.16)x10{sup -30} m{sup 3} with a 0.66% uncertainty. Our experiment is similar to done sodium in 1995 Pritchard and co-workers, several improvements: can be calculated analytically interference signals large intensity high visibility, resulting accurate phase measurements. This illustrates extreme sensitivity interferometry: when enters field, its velocity increases fractional change, equal 4x10{sup -9} for our largest 10{sup -3} accuracy.