Overview
- Intended for non-specialists
- Treats the material in a broad intuitive manner
- Covers a wide range of relevant topics
- Focuses on electronic time keeping
- Examines the revolutionary changes made possible by laser cooling and optical pumping
- Discusses the application to global navigation: in particular, GPS and Loran
- Unique, in that no other books cover the physics of atomic clocks
- Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras
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Table of contents (20 chapters)
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Front Matter
Keywords
About this book
Intended for nonspecialists with some knowledge of physics or engineering, The Quantum Beat covers a wide range of salient topics relevant to atomic clocks, treated in a broad intuitive manner with a minimum of mathematical formalism. Detailed descriptions are given of the design principles of the rubidium, cesium, hydrogen maser, and mercury ion standards; the revolutionary changes that the advent of the laser has made possible, such as laser cooling, optical pumping, the formation of "optical molasses," and the cesium "fountain" standard; and the time-based global navigation systems, Loran-C and the Global Positioning System. Also included are topics that bear on the precision and absolute accuracy of standards, such as noise, resonance line shape, the relativistic Doppler effect as well as more general relativistic notions of time relevant to synchronization of remote clocks, and time reversal symmetry.
This edition retains the essentially didactic approach to the treatment of the development of atomic clocks in the first edition, but brings up to date the extraordinary developments in recent years, culminating in clocks based on quantum resonance at optical frequency in individual ions confined in miniature electromagnetic traps. These, together with advances in the generation of wide-band coherent frequency combs spanning the spectrum as far as the optical range, has made possible the direct measurement of phenomena occurring at optical frequencies! As a result of these recent advances, in addition to the time-based GPS and LORAN C navigation systems treated in the first edition, other important applications of a fundamental scientific interest have become feasible. These include satellite-borne tests of the theory of general relativity and the equivalence principle on which it is based.
Reviews
From the reviews of the second edition:
"This revision is a very complete account of the evolution of frequency and time measurement with emphasis on the development of atomic clocks. … The 20 chapters include a wide range of topics starting with a brief history of time measurements. … Complete index, extensive references, list of suggested readings by topic. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through professionals; two-year technical program students." (R. L. Stearns, CHOICE, Vol. v4 (3), November, 2007)
Authors and Affiliations
About the author
Fouad G. Major pioneered the application of ion field confinement to microwave spectroscopy. He made the first observation of microwave resonance in trapped mercury ions as a reference for a spacecraft atomic clock at NASA laboratory(1969). Awarded the NASA "Apollo Achievement Award" 1970 and was guest researcher at the Laboratoire de l’Horloge Atomique in Orsay, France.
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: The Quantum Beat
Book Subtitle: Principles and Applications of Atomic Clocks
Authors: F. G. Major
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-69534-1
Publisher: Springer New York, NY
eBook Packages: Physics and Astronomy, Physics and Astronomy (R0)
Copyright Information: Springer-Verlag New York 2007
Hardcover ISBN: 978-0-387-69533-4
Softcover ISBN: 978-1-4419-2412-4
eBook ISBN: 978-0-387-69534-1
Edition Number: 2
Number of Pages: XII, 482
Number of Illustrations: 234 b/w illustrations
Topics: Quantum Optics, Electronics and Microelectronics, Instrumentation, Atomic, Molecular, Optical and Plasma Physics