Quantum Metrology with a Scanning Probe Atom Interferometer

We use a small Bose-Einstein condensate on an atom chip as an interferometric scanning probe to map out a microwave field near the chip surface with a few micrometers resolution. With the use of entanglement between the atoms, our interferometer overcomes the standard quantum limit of interferometry by 4 dB and maintains enhanced performance for interrogation times up to 10 ms. This corresponds to a microwave magnetic field sensitivity of 77 pT/√Hz in a probe volume of 20 μm(3). Quantum metrology with entangled atoms is useful in measurements with high spatial resolution, since the atom number in the probe volume is limited by collisional loss. High-resolution measurements of microwave near fields, as demonstrated here, are important for the development of integrated microwave circuits for quantum information processing and applications in communication technology.