Abstract This volume continues the presentation of recent results on superfluids, including novel metallic systems, superfluid liquids, and atomic/molecular gases of bosons and fermions, particularly when trapped in optical lattices. Since the discovery of superconductivity (Leyden, 1911), superfluid4 He (Moscow and Cambridge, 1937), superfluid3 He (Cornell, 1972), and observation Bose–Einstein condensation (BEC) of a gas (Colorado and MIT, 1995), the phenomenon of superfluidity has remained one of the most important topics in physics. Again and again, novel superfluids yield surprising and interesting behaviors. The many classes of metallic superconductors, including the high temperature perovskite-based oxides, MgB2, organic systems, and Fe-based pnictides, continue to offer challenges; the technical applications grow steadily. What the temperature and field limits are remains elusive. Atomic nuclei, neutron stars, and the Universe itself all involve various aspects of superfluidity; clearly the lessons learned have had a broad impact on physics as a whole.
Abstract This volume introduces the basic concepts of Bose–Einstein condensation and superfluidity. It makes special reference to the physics of ultracold atomic gases; an area in which enormous experimental and theoretical progress has been achieved in the last twenty years. Various theoretical approaches to describing the physics of interacting bosons and of interacting Fermi gases, giving rise to bosonic pairs and hence to condensation, are discussed in detail, both in uniform and harmonically trapped configurations. Special focus is given to the comparison between theory and experiment, concerning various equilibrium, dynamic, thermodynamic, and superfluid properties of these novel systems. The volume also includes discussions of ultracold gases in dimensions, quantum mixtures, and long-range dipolar interactions.
Since an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate, predicted by Einstein in 1925, was first produced in the laboratory in 1995, the study of ultracold Bose and Fermi gases has become one of the most active areas in contemporary physics. This book explains phenomena in ultracold gases from basic principles, without assuming a detailed knowledge of atomic, condensed matter, and nuclear physics. This new edition has been revised and updated, and includes new chapters on optical lattices, low dimensions, and strongly-interacting Fermi systems. This book provides a unified introduction to the physics of ultracold atomic Bose and Fermi gases for advanced undergraduate and graduate students, as well as experimentalists and theorists. Chapters cover the statistical physics of trapped gases, atomic properties, cooling and trapping atoms, interatomic interactions, structure of trapped condensates, collective modes, rotating condensates, superfluidity, interference phenomena, and trapped Fermi gases. Problems are included at the end of each chapter.
Since an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate, predicted by Einstein in 1925, was first produced in the laboratory in 1995, the study of ultracold Bose and Fermi gases has become one of the most active areas in contemporary physics. This book explains phenomena in ultracold gases from basic principles, without assuming a detailed knowledge of atomic, condensed matter, and nuclear physics. This new edition has been revised and updated, and includes new chapters on optical lattices, low dimensions, and strongly-interacting Fermi systems. This book provides a unified introduction to the physics of ultracold atomic Bose and Fermi gases for advanced undergraduate and graduate students, as well as experimentalists and theorists. Chapters cover the statistical physics of trapped gases, atomic properties, cooling and trapping atoms, interatomic interactions, structure of trapped condensates, collective modes, rotating condensates, superfluidity, interference phenomena, and trapped Fermi gases. Problems are included at the end of each chapter.
L Pitaevskii and S Stringari Oxford: Oxford University Press (2003) £55.50 (hardback), ISBN 0-19-850719-4 The Gross--Pitaevskii equation, named after one of the authors of the book, and its large number of applications for describing the properties of Bose--Einstein condensation (BEC) in trapped weakly interacting atomic gases, is the main topic of this book. In total the monograph comprises 18 chapters and is divided into two parts. Part I introduces the notion of BEC and superfluidity in general terms. The most important properties of the ideal and the weakly interacting Bose gas are described and the effects of nonuniformity due to an external potential at zero temperature are studied. The first part is then concluded with a summary of the properties of superfluid 4He. In Part II the authors describe the theoretical aspects of BEC in harmonically trapped weakly interacting atomic gases. A short and rather rudimentary chapter on collisions and trapping of atomic gases which seems to be included for completeness only is followed by a detailed analysis of the ground state,\newpage\noindent collective excitations, thermodynamics, and vortices as well as mixtures of BECs and the Josephson effect in BEC. Finally, the last three chapters deal with topics of more recent interest like BEC in optical lattices, low dimensional systems, and cold Fermi gases. The book is well written and in fact it provides numerous useful and important relations between the different properties of a BEC and covers most of the aspects of ultracold weakly interacting atomic gases from the point of view of condensed matter physics. The book contains a comprehensive introduction to BEC for physicists new to the field as well as a lot of detail and insight for those already familiar with this area. I therefore recommend it to everyone who is interested in BEC. Very clearly however, the intention of the book is not to provide prospects for applications of BEC in atomic physics, quantum optics or quantum state engineering and therefore the more practically oriented reader might sometimes wonder why exactly an equation is termed useful or important.
This is the first book devoted to Bose–Einstein condensation (BEC) as an interdisciplinary subject, covering atomic and molecular physics, laser physics, low temperature physics and astrophysics. It contains 18 authoritative review articles on experimental and theoretical research in BEC and associated phenomena. Bose–Einstein condensation is a phase transition in which a macroscopic number of particles all go into the same quantum state. It has been known for some time that this phenomenon gives rise to superfluidity in liquid helium but recent research has focused on the search for BEC in other condensed matter systems, such as excitons, spin-polarised hydrogen, laser-cooled atoms, high-temperature superconductors and subatomic matter. This unique book gives an in-depth report on progress in this field and suggests promising research topics for the future. It will be of interest to graduate students and research workers in condensed matter, low temperature, atomic and laser physics.