The ability to generate and tune quantized persistent supercurrents is crucial for building superconducting or atomtronic devices with novel functionalities. In ultracold atoms, previous methods for generating quantized supercurrents are generally based on dynamical processes to prepare atoms in metastable excited states. Here, we show that arbitrary quantized circulation states can be adiabatically prepared and tuned as the ground state of a ring-shaped Bose-Einstein condensate by utilizing spin--orbital-angular-momentum (SOAM) coupling and an external potential. There exists superfluid hysteresis for tuning supercurrents between different quantization values with nonlinear atomic interactions, which is explained by developing a nonlinear Landau-Zener theory. Our work will provide a powerful platform for studying SOAM-coupled ultracold atomic gases and building atomtronic circuits.
The ability to generate and tune quantized persistent supercurrents is crucial for building superconducting or atomtronic devices with novel functionalities. In ultracold atoms, previous methods for generating quantized supercurrents are generally based on dynamical processes to prepare atoms in metastable excited states. Here, we show that arbitrary quantized circulation states can be adiabatically prepared and tuned as the ground state of a ring-shaped Bose-Einstein condensate by utilizing spin--orbital-angular-momentum (SOAM) coupling and an external potential. There exists superfluid hysteresis for tuning supercurrents between different quantization values with nonlinear atomic interactions, which is explained by developing a nonlinear Landau-Zener theory. Our work will provide a powerful platform for studying SOAM-coupled ultracold atomic gases and building atomtronic circuits.
Persistent currents in annular geometries have played an important role in disclosing the quantum phase coherence of superconductors and mesoscopic electronic systems.Ultracold atomic gases in multiply connected traps also exhibit long-lived supercurrents and have attracted much interest both for fundamental studies of superfluid dynamics and as prototypes for atomtronics circuits.Here, we report on the realization of supercurrents in homogeneous, tunable fermionic rings.We gain exquisite, rapid control over quantized persistent currents in all regimes of the BCS-BEC crossover through a universal phase-imprinting technique, attaining on-demand circulations w as high as 9. High-fidelity readout of the superfluid circulation state is achieved by exploiting an interferometric protocol, which also yields local information about the superfluid phase around the ring.In the absence of externally introduced perturbations, we find the induced metastable supercurrents to be as long-lived as the atomic sample.Conversely, we trigger and inspect the supercurrent decay by inserting a single small obstacle within the ring.For circulations higher than a critical value, the quantized current is observed to dissipate via the emission of vortices, i.e., quantized phase slips, which we directly image, in good agreement with numerical simulations.The critical circulation at which the superflow becomes unstable is found to depend starkly on the interaction strength, taking its maximum value for the unitary Fermi gas.Our results demonstrate fast and accurate control of quantized collective excitations in a macroscopic quantum system and establish strongly interacting fermionic superfluids as excellent candidates for atomtronics applications.
Recently, hysteresis has been observed experimentally in a quantized superfluid circuit [S. Eckel, J. G. Lee, F. Jendrzejewski, N. Murray, C. W. Clark, C. J. Lobb, W. D. Phillips, M. Edwards, and G. K. Campbell, Nature (London) 506, 200 (2014)], which is a very important step for developing atomtronic devices. Here we find that quantized phase slips occur as the angular velocity rises, and the average angular momenta are quantized at special angular velocities, immune to the nonlinear interactions. When the spin and orbital angular momentum coupling is introduced, we find that two hysteresis loops could arise for each spin, and there exists a phase slip for spin up in one loop and spin down in the other loop. At the special angular velocities, a phase slip emerges for spin down in the lower state of the loop. Especially, multistability appears if the angular velocity is located in the hysteretic region. These results can promote experimental verification and pave the way for atomtronic devices.
The irrotational nature of superfluids leads to spectacular rotational properties. For the fluid to rotate, its density must locally vanish at a singular point called a quantum vortex. The annular geometry is of great interest for studying superfluidity as the gas can rotate in this geometry around a central hole without requiring any singularity, allowing the existence of persistent currents along the ring with a quantized circulation. In out experiment, we confine cold atoms dressed by a radiofrequency field in an adiabatic potential based on a quadrupolar magnetic trap. The resulting bubble-shaped potential, both very smooth and easily tunable, allows us to produce two types of ring-shaped Bose-Einstein condensates. A first strategy consists in adding a far-detuned light sheet to confine the atoms at the intersection between the bubble and the horizontal plane imposed by the light field – i.e. a ring. We present the implementation and optimization of this trap and demonstrate the possibility to prepare and observe superfluid currents in the ring. A second path exploits the centrifugal force and the anharmonicity of the adiabatic potential to create an effective Mexican hat potential by rotating the trapped atoms at the bottom of the bubble faster than the trap frequency. After having realized such a system, we probe its quadrupolar modes to characterize the rotation. The study of vortex distribution in the rotating gas also shows a thermal melting effect of the finite temperature vortex lattice.
We study the metastability and decay of multiply charged superflow in a ring-shaped atomic Bose-Einstein condensate. Supercurrent corresponding to a giant vortex with topological charge up to q=10 is phase imprinted optically and detected both interferometrically and kinematically. We observe q=3 superflow persisting for up to a minute and clearly resolve a cascade of quantized steps in its decay. These stochastic decay events, associated with vortex-induced $2\ensuremath{\pi}$ phase slips, correspond to collective jumps of atoms between discrete q values. We demonstrate the ability to detect quantized rotational states with $>99%$ fidelity, which allows a detailed quantitative study of time-resolved phase-slip dynamics. We find that the supercurrent decays rapidly if the superflow speed exceeds a critical velocity in good agreement with numerical simulations, and we also observe rare stochastic phase slips for superflow speeds below the critical velocity.
Spin-orbit coupling (SOC) plays a crucial role in many branches of physics. In this context, the recent experimental realization of the coupling between spin and linear momentum of ultracold atoms opens a completely new avenue for exploring new spin-related superfluid physics. Here we propose that another important and fundamental SOC, the coupling between spin and orbital angular momentum (SOAM), can be implemented for ultracold atoms using higher-order Laguerre-Gaussian laser beams to induce Raman coupling between two hyperfine spin states of atoms. We study the ground-state phase diagrams of SOAM-coupled Bose-Einstein condensates on a ring trap and explore their applications in gravitational force detection. Our results may provide the basis for further investigation of intriguing superfluid physics induced by SOAM coupling, such as collective excitations.