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Frontiers in Optics

Experiments on Bose-Einstein Condensates in Synthetic Spin-Orbit and Gauge Fields: Transport and Dynamics

Yong P. Chen

Published Jan 1, 2013• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

I will discuss our experiments on Bose-Einstein condensates (BEC) subject to optically-generated synthetic gauge fields and spin-orbit (SO) coupling, focusing on the dynamics and transport of BEC in spin-orbit dressed bands.
DOI
10.1364/ls.2013.lw4h.4

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In this thesis I will describe my experiments to study spin transport of spin Bose Einstein Condensates (BECs) with synthetic spin-orbit coupling. First I will describe procedures used to reproduce previous experiments with synthetic gauge fields in Bose-Einstein Condensates, from constant vector potentials to synthetic electric fields and synthetic spin-orbit coupling as well as all of the necessary calibration experiments. Next I will describe new experiments measuring spin transport induced by synthetic spin-dependent electric fields in spin-orbit coupled Bose-Einstein Condensates (BECs). The one dimensional (1D) spin-orbit coupling (SOC) is created with counter propagating Raman lasers which couple hyperfine sub-levels and momentum states of 87Rb, allowing us to engineer spin dependent vector potentials. Quickly lowering the Raman laser intensity, decreases the spin-orbit Raman coupling strength (Ω), separates the spin vector potentials and applies opposite synthetic electric fields to the two dressed spin BECs. We allow them to oscillate in opposite directions within the optical trap (exhibiting a spin dipole mode) and measure the time evolution of their momentum and density after time-of-flight (TOF). The damping of the oscillations as the spin BECs collide is found to drastically increase for larger final Raman coupling. Over longer time scales, the bare spins' oscillations damp and thermalize. However, with Raman coupling, dressed spins' oscillations are overdamped and accompanied by rich excitations in the BEC but less thermalization.
A central aim of this research is to study the dynamics of ultracold atoms in synthetic gauge fields. In this work, we developed a method to optimize the evaporation of ultracold atoms to the Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) phase. We implement a model of atomic evaporation in a trapping potential, and we find optimal parameters for the trap depth and stiffness during evaporation. Using this model, we achieve a high efficiency of optical evaporation (γ eff = 4.0). Using that BEC, we study the dynamics of the BEC in various light-induced synthetic gauge fields. In particular, we have studied the transition between adiabatic and diabatic transport in a spin-orbit (SO) coupled BEC, and found the behavior to be well understood by the Landau-Zener (LZ) theory. Various parameters of the SO coupled BEC were explored, and we demonstrated the ability to use such LZ transitions as the basis of an atomic transistor. Finally, we created a novel type of 3π spin-orbit coupling for ultracold atoms using modulated Raman coupling. Using the 3π SO coupling eigenlevel structure, we observed a Stueckelberg type interference of the BEC. We developed a model of Stueckelberg type interferometers, and we were able to quantitatively account for the observed interference fringes.
Ultracold quantum gases dressed by laser light are a powerful tool to investigate the dynamics of quantum mechanical Hamiltonians. When a Bose-Einstein condensate is placed in appropriately tailored laser fields, spin-orbit coupling as well as periodic band structures can be generated. We have developed an effective band structure picture to describe such Bose-Einstein condensates in a spin-orbit coupled lattice. Our model predicts the location of the resulting band edges. By performing atom loss measurements, we experimentally probe the predicted band structures and find excellent agreement between our experiment and our theoretical predictions.