Bose-Einstein Condensation of Europium

Heather M. Hill

Rachel J. Berkowitz

A Bose-Einstein condensate of europium atoms provides a new experimental platform for studying quantum spin interactions.

Yuki Miyazawa, Ryotaro Inoue, Hiroki Matsui +2 more

We report the realization of a Bose-Einstein condensate of europium atoms, which is a strongly dipolar species with unique properties, a highly symmetric [Xe]4f^{7}6s^{2} ^{8}S_{7/2} electronic ground state and a hyperfine structure. By means of evaporative cooling in a crossed optical dipole trap, we produce a condensate of ^{151}Eu containing up to 5×10^{4} atoms. We estimate the scattering length of ^{151}Eu to be a_{s}=110(4) a_{B} after comparing the velocities of expansion of condensates to different orientations of the atomic magnetic moments, where a_{B} is the Bohr radius. We observe deformation of the condensate in the vicinity of the Feshbach resonance at 1.32 G with a width of 10 mG.

Wojciech Gawlik

Wojciech Gawlik

Shaoxiong Li, Hiroki Saito

Motivated by the recent experimental realization of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) of europium atoms, we investigate the self-bound droplet state for a dipolar BEC with spin degrees of freedom. Under a sufficiently weak magnetic field, the droplet has a torus shape with circulating spin vectors, which is referred to as a magnetic vortex. The ground state transforms from a torus to a cigar shape through bistability with increasing magnetic field. Dynamical change of the magnetic field causes the torus to rotate due to the Einstein–de Haas effect. The magnetic vortices form a supersolid in a confined system. Published by the American Physical Society 2024