Scattering of dilute thermal atom clouds on optical Weber beams
C. L. Hernández-Cedillo, S. Bernon, H. Hattermann, J. Fortágh, and R. Jáuregui
Accepted
We report the experimental observation and a theoretical description of the scattering of free falling dilute thermal clouds of 87Rb atoms by microscopically structured light beams with parabolic-cylindrical symmetry. These structured beams are known in the literature as Weber beams. High fidelity Weber beams are generated by means of a spatial light modulator and an annular spatial filtering process, which yields a quasi propagation-invariant electromagnetic field in the region of interaction with the atom cloud. The dynamics of the atomic density profile and the phase space distribution of the scattered atoms is explored. A natural dynamical variable of Weber modes is the product of the angular momentum along the axis of propagation of the beam with a component of linear momentum perpendicular to that axis. To pave the way of the understanding about the transfer of this variable, we study the evolution of the analogous atomic variable.