Rapid Adiabatic Passage in a Rb gas with intense Frequency Chirped Laser Light

We will discuss our progress toward using intense frequency chirped laser light to control the excitation of atoms in a room-temperature gas cell. We illuminate $^{87}$Rb atoms with a 1 GHz in 8 ns frequency chirped pulse of laser light covering the 5S$_{1/2}$ F$=$1 $\to $ 5P$_{3/2}$ and explore the saturation behavior as intensity increases. We estimate that we are exciting over 90{\%} of the atoms over 1 mm$^{2}$.