2012/12/18 by Alexander L. Gaunt, Tobias F. Schmidutz, Igor Gotlibovych +2 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #cond-mat.quant-gas #cond-mat.stat-mech #physics.atom-ph #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.110.200406
published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 110, 200406 (2013) · 4 pages, 4 figures
arxiv created 2012/12/18 · arxiv updated 2013/05/17
We have observed Bose-Einstein condensation of an atomic gas in the (quasi-)uniform three-dimensional potential of an optical box trap. Condensation is seen in the bimodal momentum distribution and the anisotropic time-of-flight expansion of the condensate. The critical temperature agrees with the theoretical prediction for a uniform Bose gas. The momentum distribution of our non-condensed quantum-degenerate gas is also clearly distinct from the conventional case of a harmonically trapped sample and close to the expected distribution in a uniform system. We confirm the coherence of our condensate in a matter-wave interference experiment. Our experiments open many new possibilities for fundamental studies of many-body physics.