Emergence of Turbulence in an Oscillating Bose-Einstein Condensate

Journal Article · Fri Jul 24 04:00:00 EDT 2009 · Physical Review Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PHYSREVLETT.103.045301· OSTI ID:21347092

Henn, E A. L.; Seman, J A; Magalhaes, K M. F.; Bagnato, V S ^[1]; Roati, G ^[2]

---

1. Instituto de Fisica de Sao Carlos, Universidade de Sao Paulo, Caixa Postal 369, 13560-970 Sao Carlos, SP (Brazil)
2. LENS and Dipartimento di Fisica, Universita di Firenze, and INFM-CNR, Via Nello Carrara 1, 50019 Sesto Fiorentino (Italy)

We report on the experimental observation of vortex tangles in an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) of {sup 87}Rb atoms when an external oscillatory perturbation is introduced in the trap. The vortex tangle configuration is a signature of the presence of a turbulent regime in the cloud. We also show that this turbulent cloud suppresses the aspect ratio inversion typically observed in quantum degenerate bosonic gases during free expansion. Instead, the cloud expands keeping the ratio between their axis constant. Turbulence in atomic superfluids may constitute an alternative system to investigate decay mechanisms as well as to test fundamental theoretical aspects in this field.

• OSTI ID: 21347092
• Journal Information: Physical Review Letters, Journal Name: Physical Review Letters Journal Issue: 4 Vol. 103; ISSN 0031-9007; ISSN PRLTAO
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
ASPECT RATIO
BETA DECAY RADIOISOTOPES
BETA-MINUS DECAY RADIOISOTOPES
BOSE-EINSTEIN CONDENSATION
DIMENSIONLESS NUMBERS
INTERMEDIATE MASS NUCLEI
ISOTOPES
NUCLEI
ODD-EVEN NUCLEI
PERTURBATION THEORY
RADIOISOTOPES
RUBIDIUM 87
RUBIDIUM ISOTOPES
SUPERFLUIDITY
TURBULENCE
YEARS LIVING RADIOISOTOPES