743 research outputs found
A Waveguide for Bose-Einstein Condensates
We report on the creation of Bose-Einstein condensates of Rb in a
specially designed hybrid, dipole and magnetic trap. This trap naturally allows
the coherent transfer of matter waves into a pure dipole potential waveguide
based on a doughnut beam. Specifically, we present studies of the coherence of
the ensemble in the hybrid trap and during the evolution in the waveguide by
means of an autocorrelation interferometer scheme. By monitoring the expansion
of the ensemble in the waveguide we observe a mean field dominated acceleration
on a much longer time scale than in the free 3D expansion. Both the
autocorrelation interference and the pure expansion measurements are in
excellent agreement with theoretical predictions of the ensemble dynamics
Anisotropic diffusion of spherical particles in closely confining microchannels
This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from the publisher via the DOI in this record.We present here the measurement of the diffusivity of spherical particles closely confined by narrow microchannels. Our experiments yield a two-dimensional map of the position-dependent diffusion coefficients parallel and perpendicular to the channel axis with a resolution down to 129 nm. The diffusivity was measured simultaneously in the channel interior, the bulk reservoirs, as well as the channel entrance region. In the channel interior we found strongly anisotropic diffusion. While the perpendicular diffusion coefficient close to the confining walls decreased down to approximately 25% of the value on the channel axis, the parallel diffusion coefficient remained constant throughout the entire channel width. In addition to the experiment, we performed finite element simulations for the diffusivity in the channel interior and found good agreement with the measurements. Our results reveal the distinctive influence of strong confinement on Brownian motion, which is of significance to microfluidics as well as quantitative models of facilitated membrane transport.S.L.D. acknowledges funding from the German Academic
Exchange Service (DAAD) and the German National Academic
Foundation. S.P. and U.F.K. were supported by an ERC
starting grant. S.P. also acknowledges support from the Leverhulme
Trust and the Newton Trust through an Early Career
Fellowship
Localization and Anomalous Transport in a 1-D Soft Boson Optical Lattice
We study the dynamics of Bose-Einstein condensed atoms in a 1-D optical
lattice potential in a regime where the collective (Josephson) tunneling energy
is comparable with the on-site interaction energy, and the number of particles
per lattice site is mesoscopically large. By directly imaging the motion of
atoms in the lattice, we observe an abrupt suppression of atom transport
through the array for a critical ratio of these energies, consistent with
quantum fluctuation induced localization. Directly below the onset of
localization, the frequency of the observed superfluid transport can be
explained by a phonon excitation but deviates substantially from that predicted
by the hydrodynamic/Gross-Pitaevskii equations.Comment: 14 pages, 5 figure
Phase Fluctuations in Bose-Einstein Condensates
We demonstrate the existence of phase fluctuations in elongated Bose-Einstein
Condensates (BECs) and study the dependence of those fluctuations on the system
parameters. A strong dependence on temperature, atom number, and trapping
geometry is observed. Phase fluctuations directly affect the coherence
properties of BECs. In particular, we observe instances where the phase
coherence length is significantly smaller than the condensate size. Our method
of detecting phase fluctuations is based on their transformation into density
modulations after ballistic expansion. An analytic theory describing this
transformation is developed.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figure
Dynamics of apparent horizons in quantum gravitational collapse
We study the gravitational collapse of a massless scalar field within the
effective scenario of loop quantum gravity. Classical singularity is avoided
and replaced by a quantum bounce in this model. It is shown that, quantum
gravity effects predict a threshold scale below which no horizon can form as
the collapse evolves towards the bounce.Comment: Contribution to the Spanish Relativity Meeting in Portugal 2012
(ERE2012), Guimaraes, Portuga
Interference of a Tonks-Girardeau Gas on a Ring
We study the quantum dynamics of a one-dimensional gas of impenetrable bosons
on a ring, and investigate the interference that results when an initially
trapped gas localized on one side of the ring is released, split via an
optical-dipole grating, and recombined on the other side of the ring. Large
visibility interference fringes arise when the wavevector of the optical dipole
grating is larger than the effective Fermi wavevector of the initial gas.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figure
Observation of Phase Fluctuations in Bose-Einstein Condensates
The occurrence of phase fluctuations due to thermal excitations in
Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) is studied for a variety of temperatures and
trap geometries. We observe the statistical nature of the appearence of phase
fluctuations and characterize the dependence of their average value on
temperature, number of particles and the trapping potential. We find pronounced
phase fluctuations for condensates in very elongated traps in a broad
temperature range. The results are of great importance for the realization of
BEC in quasi 1D geometries, for matter wave interferometry with BECs, as well
as for coherence properties of guided atom laser beams.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Pseudopotential model of ultracold atomic collisions in quasi-one- and two-dimensional traps
We describe a model for s-wave collisions between ground state atoms in
optical lattices, considering especially the limits of quasi-one and two
dimensional axisymmetric harmonic confinement. When the atomic interactions are
modelled by an s-wave Fermi-pseudopotential, the relative motion energy
eigenvalues can easily be obtained. The results show that except for a bound
state, the trap eigenvalues are consistent with one- and two- dimensional
scattering with renormalized scattering amplitudes. For absolute scattering
lengths large compared with the tightest trap width, our model predicts a novel
bound state of low energy and nearly-isotropic wavefunction extending on the
order of the tightest trap width.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figures; submitted to Phys. Rev.
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