Spinor condensate of $^{87}$Rb as a dipolar gas

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that in a spinor condensate of $^{87}$Rb, dipolar interactions dominate the spin mixing dynamics, leading to a thermal equilibrium with equally distributed kinetic energy among magnetic components.

Contribution

It reveals that dipolar interactions, rather than contact interactions, govern the spin mixing dynamics in $^{87}$Rb spinor condensates.

Findings

System evolves to thermal equilibrium with energy evenly distributed.

Dipolar interactions dominate over contact interactions in spin dynamics.

Magnetic component separation is driven by dipolar interactions.

Abstract

We consider a spinor condensate of $^{87}$Rb atoms in F=1 hyperfine state confined in an optical dipole trap. Putting initially all atoms in $m_F=0$ component we find that the system evolves towards a state of thermal equilibrium with kinetic energy equally distributed among all magnetic components. We show that this process is dominated by the dipolar interaction of magnetic spins rather than spin mixing contact potential. Our results show that because of a dynamical separation of magnetic components the spin mixing dynamics in $^{87}$Rb condensate is governed by dipolar interaction which plays no role in a single component rubidium system in a magnetic trap.