Thermalization in a Spin-Orbit coupled Bose gas by enhanced spin Coulomb drag

TL;DR

This paper investigates how spin-orbit coupling influences thermalization in ultra-cold Bose gases, revealing increased damping and lower final temperatures due to enhanced spin drag effects.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of the dynamics of spin-orbit coupling in Bose gases and quantifies the enhancement of spin drag and its impact on thermalization.

Findings

Spin-orbit coupling significantly increases damping towards equilibrium.

Spin drag is enhanced by a factor of approximately 8.9 due to spin-orbit coupling.

Final temperature of the Bose gas is lowered after thermalization with spin-orbit effects.

Abstract

An important component of the structure of the atom, the effects of spin-orbit coupling are present in many sub-fields of physics. Most of these effects are present continuously. We present a detailed study of the dynamics of changing the spin-orbit coupling in an ultra-cold Bose gas, coupling the motion of the atoms to their spin. We find that the spin-orbit coupling greatly increases the damping towards equilibrium. We interpret this damping as spin drag, which is enhanced by spin-orbit coupling rate, scaled by a remarkable factor of $8.9(6)$~s. We also find that spin-orbit coupling lowers the final temperature of the Bose gas after thermalization.