Frankfurt 2006 – scientific programme

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Q: Quantenoptik und Photonik

Q 38: Quantengase IV

Q 38.8: Talk

Wednesday, March 15, 2006, 12:25–12:40, HVI

BEC under microgravity — •Gerrit Nandi, Endre Kajari, Reinhold Walser, and Wolfgang P. Schleich — Abteilung Quantenphysik, Universität Ulm, Germany

Targeting the long term goal of studying Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) on a space platform, several groups currently focus on the implementation of a BEC experiment at the ZARM drop tower in Bremen, as well as the theoretical description of a BEC under microgravity [1],[2].

In this contribution, we theoretically study the free evolution of the full three dimensional Gross-Pitaevskii equation of a freely falling BEC. Moreover, a BEC with two internal states can be used as a coherent matter-wave interferometer [3]. We outline the prospects of corresponding experiments in the drop tower.

[1] A. Vogel et al., Conference proceedings "Quantum Mechanics for Space", Paris (2005)

[2] J. F. Dobson, Phys. Rev. Lett. 73, 2244 (1994).

[3] M. Kasevich and S. Chu, Appl. Phys. B B 54, 321 (1992).