Laser driving of Superradiant scattering at variable incidence angle

TL;DR

This paper investigates how the angle of a pump laser affects superradiant scattering in a Bose-Einstein condensate, revealing asymmetries in scattering modes influenced by laser direction, supported by experiments and simulations.

Contribution

It introduces the study of variable incidence angles in superradiant scattering, extending previous work limited to fixed orientations, and demonstrates the impact of laser direction on scattering asymmetry.

Findings

Asymmetrically populated scattering modes depend on laser angle.

Experimental results align with Maxwell-Schrödinger simulations.

Laser direction significantly influences superradiant scattering patterns.

Abstract

We study superradiant scattering from a Bose-Einstein condensate using a pump laser incident at variable angle and show the presence of asymmetrically populated scattering modes. Experimental data reveal that the direction of the pump laser plays a significant role in the formation of this asymmetry, result which is in good agreement with numerical simulations based on coupled Maxwell-Schr\"{o}dinger equations. Our study complements the gap of previous work in which the pump laser was only applied along the short axis or the long axis of a condensate, and extends our knowledge about cooperative scattering processes.