Experiments with far-from-equilibrium quantum superfluids and the determination of properties via correlations and symmetries

Abstract

Recently, we have been running experiments where a superfluid rubidium Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is magnectically perturbed, and pushed out of equilibrium. This process usually drives the BEC towards quantum turbulence, which is one of the most studied phenomena in the laboratory. Turbulent BECs present large density and phase fluctuations, which are captured by imaging the atomic density distribution, probed by optical absorption during expansion under time-of-flight. One of the main properties of this system is the spatial correlation of density, as well as the existence of spatial symmetries. In this scientific initiation proposal, a few algorithms will be tested and developed in order to determine the density-density correlation, as well as to capture the existence of spatial symmetries in the resulting atomic distribution. The project comprises data taking and then processing the acquired images.