Faraday Rotation

Theory, Application, and Issues

With a neat Tangent

Zachary Marshall
 Faraday Rotation
 First noticed in 1845 by Michael Faraday
 Linearly polarized light near resonance
travels through a material (esp. alkali
metal gas) in a B-Field
 The B-Field must have a component in
the direction of propagation.
 Polarization rotates
 He wrote in his notebook, "I have at last
succeeded in illuminating a magnetic
curve or line of force and in magnetising
a ray of light"
 Some Hand Waving
 Applied magnetic field creates Zeeman
splitting of energy levels
 LHC and RHC polarized light see different
scattering cross-sections, so different
refractive indices, and so have different phase
velocities
 Their different propagation means the linear
polarization of light rotates
 Again, with Math
 Zeeman shift changes resonance by gF0Bz
 V B L
 n- - n+) L / 

  = CRb L [alkali] B / 2

 n =  pi c2 ni
 Faraday Rotator / Isolator
 Optical element rotating the polarization of
light
 Polarizer - Faraday Rotator – Polarizer
 Prevents contamination and “backsplash” of
electromagnetic waves
 Common materials for use in 700-1100 nm
range: terbium doped borosillicate glass and
terbium gallium garnet crystal (TGG).
 They can be magnetized before hand.
For Measuring Number Density
 Cell filled with a gas, at least some of which is
an alkali metal (usually below its boiling point)
 Tunable laser (e.g. Ti:Saph) through the center
of a cell
What could possibly go wrong?
 Optical pumping during measurement
 Laser heats the cell interior

 Thermal fluctuations in a cell

 Remember: What ever can go wrong, will

go wrong. But there are ways around
each problem.
How else could we find
[Rb]?
Here comes the thermo…
 Killian Equations
 First developed in the 1920’s, credit is usually
given to Killian (1926).
 d(ln P)/dT = H/(R T2) (Clausius-Clapeyron)
 In a small range, H is temp. invar.
 Resulting equation is of the form

log P = A + B/T
 Additional terms like C log T, D / T 2 are
common
So What are A and B for Rb?
And what did they get?
 Faraday to the Rescue?

 Claimed to be the “only safe method.”

 But why do we care so much?

 Pumping Nobel Gasses
 Rubidium is polarized with circularly polarized
laser
 Collisions transfer spin to Xe / He
 Nitrogen prevents immediate spin loss
 Depolarization comes from collisions
 Rb depolarization term
depends on Rb number
density
He-3 Lung Image
And Some Secret Projects…
 And in Space
 Faraday rotation occurs in the interstellar
medium due to free electrons
  = 2 C * integral of B*ne ds

 If we know ne, we can determine B along

the path to us.

 Radio waves going through the

ionosphere rotate as well.