Production of quantum-degenerate strontium gases

We report on an improved scheme to generate Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) and degenerate Fermi gases of strontium. This scheme allows us to create quantum gases with higher atom number, a shorter time of the experimental cycle, or deeper quantum degeneracy than before. We create a BEC of ⁸⁴Sr exceeding 10⁷ atoms, which is a 30-fold improvement over previously reported experiments. We increase the atom number of ⁸⁶Sr BECs to 2.5×10⁴ (a fivefold improvement) and refine the generation of attractively interacting ⁸⁸Sr BECs. We present a scheme to generate ⁸⁴Sr BECs with a cycle time of 2 s. We create deeply degenerate ⁸⁷Sr Fermi gases with T/TF as low as 0.10(1), where the number of populated nuclear spin states can be set to any value between one and ten. Furthermore, we report on a total of five different double-degenerate Bose-Bose and Bose-Fermi mixtures. These studies prepare an excellent starting point for applications of strontium quantum gases anticipated in the near future.