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APS » Journals » Phys. Rev. Lett. » Volume 86 » Issue 19
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Phys. Rev. Lett. 86, 4211–4214 (2001)

Controlled Collapse of a Bose-Einstein Condensate

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J. L. Roberts, N. R. Claussen, S. L. Cornish, E. A. Donley, E. A. Cornell*, and C. E. Wieman
JILA, National Institute of Standards and Technology and the University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado 80309-0440
and the Department of Physics, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado 80309-0440

Received 22 January 2001; published in the issue dated 7 May 2001

The point of instability of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) due to attractive interactions was studied. Stable 85Rb BECs were created and then caused to collapse by slowly changing the atom-atom interaction from repulsive to attractive using a Feshbach resonance. At a critical value, an abrupt transition was observed in which atoms were ejected from the condensate. By measuring the onset of this transition as a function of number and attractive interaction strength, we determined the stability condition to be N|a|/aho = 0.459±0.012±0.054, slightly lower than the predicted value of 0.574.

© 2001 The American Physical Society

URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.86.4211
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevLett.86.4211
PACS:
03.75.Fi, 05.30.Jp, 32.80.Pj, 34.50.-s

*Quantum Physics Division, National Institute of Standards and Technology.

 
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