Quench-induced supercurrents in an annular Bose gas

• Published in: Physical review letters Vol. 113; no. 13; p. 135302
• Main Authors: Corman, L, Chomaz, L, Bienaimé, T, Desbuquois, R, Weitenberg, C, Nascimbène, S, Dalibard, J, Beugnon, J
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 26-09-2014
• Subjects: Annular; Clouds; Disks; Interference; Phase transformations; Spirals; Stochasticity; Two dimensional
• ISSN: 0031-9007; 1079-7114
• DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.113.135302

We create supercurrents in annular two-dimensional Bose gases through a temperature quench of the normal-to-superfluid phase transition. We detect the magnitude and the direction of these supercurrents by measuring spiral patterns resulting from the interference of the cloud with a central reference disk. These measurements demonstrate the stochastic nature of the supercurrents. We further measure their distribution for different quench times and compare it with predictions based on the Kibble-Zurek mechanism.