Phase diagram for a Bose-Einstein condensate moving in an optical lattice

The stability of superfluid currents in a system of ultracold bosons was studied using a moving optical lattice. Superfluid currents in a very weak lattice become unstable when their momentum exceeds 0.5 recoil momentum. Superfluidity vanishes already for zero momentum as the lattice deep reaches the Mott insulator(MI) phase transition. We study the phase diagram for the disappearance of superfluidity as a function of momentum and lattice depth between these two limits. Our phase boundary extrapolates to the critical lattice depth for the superfluid-to-MI transition with 2% precision. When a one-dimensional gas was loaded into a moving optical lattice a sudden broadening of the transition between stable and unstable phases was observed.Comment: 4 figure

About multiplicities and applications to Bezout numbers

Let $(A,\mathfrak{m},\Bbbk)$ denote a local Noetherian ring and $\mathfrak{q}$ an ideal such that $\ell_A(M/\mathfrak{q}M) < \infty$ for a finitely generated $A$-module $M$. Let \au = a_1,\ldots,a_d denote a system of parameters of $M$ such that $a_i \in \mathfrak{q}^{c_i} \setminus \mathfrak{q}^{c_i+1}$ for $i=1,\ldots,d$. It follows that \chi := e_0(\au;M) - c \cdot e_0(\mathfrak{q};M) \geq 0, where $c = c_1\cdot \ldots \cdot c_d$. The main results of the report are a discussion when $\chi = 0$ resp. to describe the value of $\chi$ in some particular cases. Applications concern results on the multiplicity e_0(\au;M) and applications to Bezout numbers.Comment: 11 pages, to appear Springer INdAM-Series, Vol. 20 (2017

Atomic Resonance and Scattering

Contains reports on three research projects.Joint Services Electronics Programs (U. S. Army, U.S. Navy, and U. S. Air Force) under Contract DA 28-043-AMC-02536(E

Optical Weak Link between Two Spatially Separate Bose-Einstein Condensates

Two spatially separate Bose-Einstein condensates were prepared in an optical double-well potential. A bidirectional coupling between the two condensates was established by two pairs of Bragg beams which continuously outcoupled atoms in opposite directions. The atomic currents induced by the optical coupling depend on the relative phase of the two condensates and on an additional controllable coupling phase. This was observed through symmetric and antisymmetric correlations between the two outcoupled atom fluxes. A Josephson optical coupling of two condensates in a ring geometry is proposed. The continuous outcoupling method was used to monitor slow relative motions of two elongated condensates and characterize the trapping potential.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure

Double-impulse magnetic focusing of launched cold atoms.

We have theoretically investigated three-dimensional focusing of a launched cloud of cold atoms using a pair of magnetic lens pulses (the alternate-gradient method). Individual lenses focus radially and defocus axially or vice versa. The performance of the two possible pulse sequences are compared and found to be ideal for loading both 'pancake' and 'sausage' shaped magnetic/optical microtraps. It is shown that focusing aberrations are considerably smaller for double-impulse magnetic lenses compared to single-impulse magnetic lenses. An analysis of clouds focused by the double-impulse technique is presented

Low velocity quantum reflection of Bose-Einstein condensates

We studied quantum reflection of Bose-Einstein condensates at normal incidence on a square array of silicon pillars. For incident velocities of 2.5-26 mm/s observations agreed with theoretical predictions that the Casimir-Polder potential of a reduced density surface would reflect slow atoms with much higher probability. At low velocities (0.5-2.5 mm/s), we observed that the reflection probability saturated around 60% rather than increasing towards unity. We present a simple model which explains this reduced reflectivity as resulting from the combined effects of the Casimir-Polder plus mean field potential and predicts the observed saturation. Furthermore, at low incident velocities, the reflected condensates show collective excitations.Comment: 4 figure

Atomic Resonance and Scattering

Contains research objectives and reports on one research project.Joint Services Electronics Programs (U. S. Army, U.S. Navy, and U.S. Air Force) under Contract DA 28-043-AMC-02536(E)U.S. Navy (Office of Naval Research) under Contract N00014-67-A-0204-0006Sloan Fund for Basic Research (M. I. T. Grant 170