Radiofrequency spectroscopy of a linear array of Bose-Einstein condensates in a magnetic lattice

TL;DR

This study demonstrates site-resolved radiofrequency spectroscopy of Bose-Einstein condensates in a magnetic lattice, revealing high uniformity, low temperatures, and the persistence of condensate fractions in elongated traps, with insights into atom loss mechanisms.

Contribution

First site-resolved RF spectroscopy of BECs in a magnetic lattice, showing high uniformity and detailed characterization of condensate properties across many sites.

Findings

Magnetic lattice is highly uniform with trap bottom variations of only +/- 0.4 mG.

Achieved temperatures as low as 0.16 microkelvin and condensate fractions up to 80%.

Observed atom number decay with a half-life of about 0.9 seconds due to three-body losses.

Abstract

We report site-resolved radiofrequency spectroscopy measurements of Bose-Einstein condensates of 87Rb atoms in about 100 sites of a one-dimensional 10 micron-period magnetic lattice produced by a grooved magnetic film plus bias fields. Site-to-site variations of the trap bottom, atom temperature, condensate fraction and chemical potential indicate that the magnetic lattice is remarkably uniform, with variations in trap bottoms of only +/- 0.4 mG. At the lowest trap frequencies (radial and axial frequencies 1.5 kHz and 260 Hz, respectively), temperatures down to 0.16 microkelvin are achieved in the magnetic lattice and at the smallest trap depths (50 kHz) condensate fractions up to 80% are observed. With increasing radial trap frequency (up to 20 kHz, or aspect ratio up to about 80) large condensate fractions persist and the highly elongated clouds approach the quasi-1D Bose gas regime. The temperature estimated from analysis of the spectra is found to increase by a factor of about five which may be due to suppression of rethermalising collisions in the quasi-1D Bose gas. Measurements for different holding times in the lattice indicate a decay of the atom number with a half-life of about 0.9 s due to three-body losses and the appearance of a high temperature (about 1.5 microkelvin) component which is attributed to atoms that have acquired energy through collisions with energetic three-body decay products.