Abstract
How much time does a tunneling particle spend in a barrier? A Larmor clock, one proposal to answer this question, measures the interaction between the particle and the barrier region using an auxiliary degree of freedom of the particle to clock the dwell time inside the barrier. We report on precise Larmor time measurements of ultracold atoms tunneling through an optical barrier, which confirm longstanding predictions of tunneling times. We observe that atoms generally spend less time tunneling through higher barriers and that this time decreases for lower energy particles. For the lowest measured incident energy, at least 90% of transmitted atoms tunneled through the barrier, spending an average of inside. This is faster than atoms traversing the same barrier with energy close to the barrier’s peak and faster than when the atoms traverse a barrier with 23% less energy.
- Received 1 February 2021
- Accepted 12 July 2021
- Corrected 28 October 2021
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.127.133001
© 2021 American Physical Society
Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)
Corrections
28 October 2021
Correction: The temperature value in the first sentence of the fourth paragraph contained a typographical error and has been replaced.