Suppressing phase decoherence of a single atom qubit with Carr-Purcell-Meiboom-Gill sequence

We experimentally demonstrate the strong suppression of dephasing of a qubit stored in a single Rb-87 atom in an optical dipole trap by using Carr-Purcell-Meiboom-Gill (CPMG) pulse sequences. Regarded as a repetition of spin echo, CPMG sequence is an excellent choice for suppressing both inhomogeneous and homogeneous phase decoherence mechanisms. In comparison with atomic ensembles, the dephasing due to atomic collisions disappears for individual atoms. Thus, CPMG suppression effect is efficient with a few pi-pulses. In our trap with 830 nm wavelength and 0.7 mK potential depth, the reversible inhomogeneous dephasing time is T-2* = 1.4 ms. We obtain the homogeneous dephasing time of T-2' = 103 ms in the spin echo process. By employing CPMG sequence with pulse number n = 6, the homogeneous dephasing is further suppressed by a factor of 3, and its corresponding coherence time is extended to T-2' = 304 ms. (C) 2013 Optical Society of America