Experimental Apparatus for Producing Large Na-23 Bose-Einstein Condensates

Abstract

We describe our experimental apparatus for quickly producing large Bose-Einstein condensates of Na-23 atoms. We collect atoms in a dark magneto-optical trap from a zero-crossing Zeeman slower and then capture the atoms in an optically plugged magnetic quadrupole trap and apply rf evaporation to cool the atoms into the quantum degenerate regime. We slightly displace a. circular plug beam from the it trap center to break the ring symmetry and form a single global minimum in the combined trapping potential. Our system reliably generates a quasipure condensate with over 10(7) atoms every 17 s. We load the condensate into an elongated optical dipole trap.