  We report the realization of a BEC of metastable helium-4 atoms (4He*) in an
all optical potential. Up to 10^5 spin polarized 4He* atoms are condensed in an
optical dipole trap formed from a single, focused, vertically propagating far
off-resonance laser beam. The vertical trap geometry is chosen to best match
the resolution characteristics of a delay-line anode micro-channel plate
detector capable of registering single He* atoms. We also confirm the
instability of certain spin state combinations of 4He* to two-body inelastic
processes, which necessarily affects the scope of future experiments using
optically trapped spin mixtures. In order to better quantify this constraint,
we measure spin state resolved two-body inelastic loss rate coefficients in the
optical trap.
