期刊名称：Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
印刷版ISSN：0027-8424
电子版ISSN：1091-6490
出版年度：2022
卷号：119
期号：1
DOI：10.1073/pnas.2111078118
语种：English
出版社：The National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
摘要：Significance
Understanding the combined effects of disorder and interactions in quantum many-body systems is a key topic of condensed matter physics. While most studies have considered a static disorder, here we investigate the relaxation dynamics of a three-dimensional Bose–Einstein condensate after switching on or off an optical disorder potential. We study, experimentally and numerically, the transient and steady-state atomic density distribution and the ability of the gas to hydrodynamically expand, directly reflecting long-range phase coherence. We find that, when the gas is exposed to disorder, long-range phase coherence breaks down one order of magnitude faster than the density distribution responds. In the opposite case, surprisingly, long-range coherence takes two orders of magnitude longer times to revive than the density relaxation.
Relaxation of quantum systems is a central problem in nonequilibrium physics. In contrast to classical systems, the underlying quantum dynamics results not only from atomic interactions but also from the long-range coherence of the many-body wave function. Experimentally, nonequilibrium states of quantum fluids are usually created using moving objects or laser potentials, directly perturbing and detecting the system’s density. However, the fate of long-range phase coherence for hydrodynamic motion of disordered quantum systems is less explored, especially in three dimensions. Here, we unravel how the density and phase coherence of a Bose–Einstein condensate of
6Li
2 molecules respond upon quenching on or off an optical speckle potential. We find that, as the disorder is switched on, long-range phase coherence breaks down one order of magnitude faster than the density of the quantum gas responds. After removing it, the system needs two orders of magnitude longer times to reestablish quantum coherence, compared to the density response. We compare our results with numerical simulations of the Gross–Pitaevskii equation on large three-dimensional grids, finding an overall good agreement. Our results shed light on the importance of long-range coherence and possibly long-lived phase excitations for the relaxation of nonequilibrium quantum many-body systems.
关键词：enultracold quantum gasesdisordernonequilibrium dynamicsinteracting quantum systems
