Creation and counting of defects in a temperature-quenched Bose-Einstein condensate

Year: 2016

Authors: Donatello S., Serafini S., Bienaimé T, Dalfovo F., Lamporesi G., Ferrari G.

Autors Affiliation: INO-CNR BEC Center and Dipartimento di Fisica, Universit`a di Trento, 38123 Povo, Italy; Trento Institute for Fundamental Physics and Applications, INFN, 38123 Povo, Italy

Abstract: We study the spontaneous formation of defects in the order parameter of a trapped ultracold bosonic gas while crossing the critical temperature for Bose-Einstein condensation at
different rates. The system has the shape of an elongated ellipsoid, whose transverse width can be varied. For slow enough temperature quenches we find a power-law scaling of the average defect number with the quench rate, as predicted by the Kibble-Zurek mechanism. A breakdown of such a scaling is found for fast quenches, leading to a saturation of the average defect number. We suggest an explanation for this saturation in terms of the mutual interactions among defects.

Journal/Review: PHYSICAL REVIEW A

Volume: 94 (2)      Pages from: 023628-1  to: 023628-8

KeyWords: Kibble-Zurek; defects; quench
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.94.023628

Citations: 26
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