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Description
Selective entanglement of multiple ions requires accurate optical delivery to a fibre array, which in turn demands stable alignment of the beam, fibre, and hexapod positioning system. This project investigated the use of a PI H-811.F2 hexapod to align a high-NA fibre array with micrometre-level precision, using stored coordinate systems to enable repeatable optimisation. The fibre array analysed in this work had a numerical aperture of approximately 0.069 ± 0.002.
Alignment methods based on both camera imaging and optical power measurements were developed, with the advantages, limitations, and practical considerations of each approach discussed. An interleaved ABBA measurement sequence was used to minimise drift-induced bias, and measurements were performed in both near-aligned and highly misaligned configurations. In the aligned case, the smallest detectable translations were 11.6773 µm in X, 3.4098 µm in Y, and 3.2152 µm in Z.
This work establishes a framework for integrating the hexapod into automated alignment and drift-correction routines, providing a practical route towards reliable optical coupling for trapped-ion readout and future scalable quantum networking experiments.