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F Gerbier

Publications and source records attributed to F Gerbier.

5 recordsLinked to original sources

Critical temperature of a trapped, weakly interacting Bose gas.

We report on measurements of the critical temperature of a harmonically trapped, weakly interacting Bose gas as a function of atom number. Our results exclude ideal-gas behavior by more than two standard deviations, and agree quantitatively with mean-field theory. At our level of sensitivity, we find no additional shift due to critical fluctuations. In the course of this measurement, the onset of hydrodynamic expansion in the thermal component has been observed. Our thermometry method takes this feature into account.

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Momentum spectroscopy of 1D phase fluctuations in Bose-Einstein condensates.

We measure the axial momentum distribution of Bose-Einstein condensates with an aspect ratio of 152 using Bragg spectroscopy. We observe the Lorentzian momentum distribution characteristic of one-dimensional phase fluctuations. The temperature dependence of the width of this distribution provides a quantitative test of quasicondensate theory. In addition, we observe a condensate length consistent with the suppression of density fluctuations, even when phase fluctuations are large.

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Atom laser divergence.

We measure the angular divergence of a quasicontinuous, rf-outcoupled, free-falling atom laser as a function of the outcoupling frequency. The data are compared to a Gaussian-beam model of laser propagation that generalizes the standard formalism of photonic lasers. Our treatment includes diffraction, magnetic lensing, and interaction between the atom laser and the condensate. We find that the dominant source of divergence is the condensate-laser interaction.

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Quasicontinuous atom laser in the presence of gravity.

We analyze the extraction from a trapped Bose-Einstein condensate to a nontrapping state of a coherent atomic beam and its subsequent fall, at T = 0 K. Our treatment fully takes gravity into account but neglects the mean-field potential exerted on the free falling beam by the trapped atoms. We derive analytical expressions for the output rate and the output mode of the quasicontinuous "atom laser." Comparison with experimental data of Bloch et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 82, 3008 (1999)] is satisfactory.

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