Konstanz 1998 – scientific programme

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SYA: Symposium Bose-Einstein-Kondensation

SYA 2: Symposium Bose-Einstein-Kondensation II

SYA 2.3: Talk

Monday, March 16, 1998, 14:30–14:45, R 711

Phase and phase diffusion of a split Bose condensate [1] — •Martin Wilkens¹ and Juha Javanainen² — ¹Institut f"ur Physik, Universit"at Potsdam, Am Neuen Palais 10, 14469 Potsdam — ²Department of Physics, University of Connecticut, Storrs, Connecticut 06269-3046

We analyze theoretically an experiment in which a trapped Bose-Einstein condensate is cut in half, and the parts are subsequently allowed to interfere. If the delay between cutting and atom detection is small, the interference pattern of the two halves of the condensate is the same in every experiment. However, for longer delays the spatial phase of the interference shows random fluctuations from one experiment to the other. This phase diffusion is characterized quantitatively.

[1] J. Javanainen and M. Wilkens, Phys. Rev. Lett. 78, 4675 (1997)