We report on the microscopic imaging of individual sites of an optical lattice with a period of 5.3 μm created by a retroreflected, focused ${\mathrm{CO}}_2$-laser beam. In this one-dimensional lattice, the Lamb-Dicke limit is fulfilled in all three spatial dimensions. Single lattice sites have been individually addressed with a focused near-resonant laser beam. Because of the negligible decoherence rate from spontaneous photon scattering such a lattice holds intriguing prospects for the realization of fault-tolerant quantum logic gates.

• Received 31 May 2000

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.62.051801