MEASUREMENT OF THE GRAVITATIONAL ACCELERATION OF AN ATOM WITH A LIGHT-PULSE ATOM INTERFEROMETER

Velocity sensitive stimulated Raman transitions have been used to measure the gravitational acceleration, g, of laser cooled sodium atoms in an atomic fountain geometry. By using an improved scheme to drive the Raman transitions, we have demonstrated a resolution of 3 x 10(-8) g after 2 x 10(3) seconds of integration time. In addition to presenting recent experimental results, we review the theory of stimulated Raman transitions as it applies to atom interferometers and discuss the prospects of an atom interferometer-based gravimeter with better than 10(-10) g absolute accuracy.