Phase Sensitive Recombination of Two Bose-Einstein Condensates on an Atom Chip

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that phase-sensitive recombination of two Bose-Einstein condensates on an atom chip causes phase-dependent heating, enabling phase readout in atom interferometry without ballistic expansion, with potential dissipation of dark solitons as the cause.

Contribution

It introduces a phase-sensitive recombination method that allows phase measurement of BECs through heating effects on an atom chip.

Findings

Heating depends on the relative phase of condensates

Number of condensate atoms reduces by 10-40%

Provides a robust phase readout method for atom interferometers

Abstract

The recombination of two split Bose-Einstein condensates on an atom chip is shown to result in heating which depends on the relative phase of the two condensates. This heating reduces the number of condensate atoms between 10 and 40% and provides a robust way to read out the phase of an atom interferometer without the need for ballistic expansion. The heating may be caused by the dissipation of dark solitons created during the merging of the condensates.