Abstract
Peter Engels
Experimental wavefunction engineering with BECs
P. Engels, B. P. Anderson, I. Coddington, P. C. Haljan, and E. A. Cornell
JILA / University of Boulder, Colorado
The creation of BECs in dilute alkali gases provides us with a unique
opportunity to study quantum mechanical wavefunctions with a macroscopic
object. Using a wavefunction engineering technique developped at JILA, the
BEC's wavefunction can be taylored. By this means we have been able to
create topological structures like solitons and vortices. In our
spherically symmetric condensates the solitons undergo a dynamical
instability (snake instability) and decay into vortex rings.
In this talk the experimental techniques as well as our experimental
observations regarding topological structures such as solitons, vortex
rings, vortex lines and vortex lattices will be discussed.
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