Experiments with Bose-Einstein Condensates aboard the Space Station: Quantum control and quantum sensing in the Coldest Spot in Space

CQT Colloquium

Speaker: Nicholas P. Bigelow, The University of Rochester
Abstract: I will describe the work of the Consortium for Ultracold Atoms over the past four years using NASA’s and the Jet Propulsion Lab’s Cold Atom Laboratory (CAL), a shared user facility for investigating quantum matter in microgravity. In the first phases of our work we developed shortcut to adiabaticity protocols for transporting a rubidium Bose-Einstein Condensate (BEC) with positioning accuracy of ~70 nm and release velocity at or below the 100µm/s level. Deep cooling was similarly achieved using delta-kick-cooling to kinetic temperatures at or below 50 pK, creating the coldest spot in Space. I will also describe our preliminary atom interferometry experiments using both Rb and K, and our demonstration of high-performance sensing of magnetic fields and field gradients as well as preliminary tests of the Einstein Equivalence Principle.