Optical frequency measurements of 6s 2S1/2-6p 2P3/2 transition in a 133Cs atomic beam using a femtosecond laser frequency comb -: art. no. 042505

Optical frequencies of the hyperfine components of the D-2 line in Cs-133 are determined using high-resolution spectroscopy and a femtosecond laser frequency comb. A narrow-linewidth probe laser excites the 6s S-2(1/2) (F = 3, 4) --> 6p P-2(3/2)(F=2,3,4,5) transition in a highly collimated atomic beam. Fluorescence spectra are taken by scanning the laser frequency over the excited-state hyperfine structure. The laser optical frequency is referenced to a Cs fountain clock via a reference laser and a femtosecond laser frequency comb. A retroreflected laser beam is used to estimate and minimize the Doppler shift due to misalignment between the probe laser and the atomic beam. We achieve an angular resolution on the order of 5 X 10(-6) rad. The final uncertainties (similar to +/- 5 kHz) in the frequencies of the optical transitions are a factor of 20 better than previous results [T. Udem et al., Phys. Rev. A 62, 031801 (2000).]. We find the centroid of the 6s S-2(1/2) --> 6p P-2(3/2) transition to be f(D2) = 351 725 718.4744(51) MHz.