This is to remind you of our TODAY's Physics Colloquium:
Speaker: Prof. Jean Dalibard, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Paris
Date: Wednesday, January 14, 2004
Time: 16:45 h (coffee at 16:15 h in front of auditorium)
Place: ETH Hönggerberg, HPV G4
Title: Manipulation of Atomic Condensates: Quantum Coherence at Work
Abstract:
Coherence and superfluidity are hallmark properties of quantum fluids and encompass a whole class of fundamental phenomena. With the achievement of Bose-Einstein condensation in atomic gases, it becomes possible to study these phenomena in a clean and well controlled environment. The talk will review the physical origin and the experimental evidences of the remarkable coherence properties of quantum gases. It will discuss efforts to produce a continuous and intense source of coherent matter waves. It will then focus on the properties of a rotating condensate, in which quantized vortices are nucleated. Recent investigations of the dynamics of a single vortex line as well as a vortex array will be presented, and the connections with other domains of macroscopic quantum physics, such as Quantum Hall phenomena, will be discussed.