Microwave interrogation of cesium atoms cooled in isotropic light

Describes here a configuration of an atomic clock using a source of cesium atoms cooled with isotropic light. This three-dimensional (3-D)-cooling scheme yields a number of atoms of nearly 10/sup 9/ with a temperature below 100 /spl mu/K. These values are suitable for metrological applications. We present the preliminary results obtained and give a first estimation of the frequency performances for this kind of atomic clock.