Group seminar at LMU and Zoom: Shaping uniform transport channels for ⁶Li with a spatial light modulator

David Kielert, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Group seminar at LMU seminar room and Zoom
Friday, 24 July 2026, 10:00am (CEST)

Ultracold-atom quantum-transport experiments realize a two-terminal circuit in which atoms are guided through a channel drawn by light. In the ETH lithium experiment this channel is a TEM₀₁-like nodal line from a fixed 0-π phase plate, whose Gaussian envelope leaves a residual axial potential that distorts transport and fixes the channel geometry. In my master's thesis I use a liquid-crystal spatial light modulator to generate configurable, near-uniform transport channels. I first pursue holographic (phase-only) shaping, examining the difficulties that uniform, extended target patterns raise together with the remedies for each, and identify a deterministic mapping approach that succeeds where established holographic algorithms fail. I then explore a second, non-holographic route in which the SLM acts as an image-plane amplitude filter.