Speaker
Description
Miniaturized high-sensitivity OPMs require – simultaneously – small volumes, temperature control, magnetic field control, and low magnetic noise. This presents interlinked challenges when designing vapor cells for OPMs. We report a dual-chamber ($4 \times 4 \times 1.5$ mm$^{3}$) low-noise functionalized vapor cell (FVC) and its use in a single-beam SERF OPM. The FVC, made at wafer scale by MEMS techniques, incorporates surface metallization for both heating and thermal monitoring, while also maintaining a low thermal magnetic noise. We discuss also the zero-field operation of the OPM, in which we observe a magnetic sensitivity of about $ 18 \rm fT/\sqrt{\rm Hz}$. This FVC design is a step toward mass producible OPMs for applications in sectors including medical imaging, space and geophysical.
