Nonadiabatic Diffraction of Matter Waves

Abstract

Diffraction phenomena usually can be formulated in terms of a potential that induces the redistribution of a wave's momentum. Using an atomic Bose-Einstein condensate coupled to the orbitals of a state-selective optical lattice, we investigate a hitherto unexplored nonadiabatic regime of diffraction in which no diffracting potential can be defined, and in which the adiabatic dressed states are strongly mixed. We show how, in the adiabatic limit, the observed coupling between internal and external dynamics gives way to standard Kapitza-Dirac diffraction of atomic matter waves. We demonstrate the utility of our scheme for atom interferometry and discuss prospects for studies of dissipative superfluid phenomena.

5 pages, 4 figures slightly shortened text and compressed fig. 2

References in corpus (9)

• Atom Interferometers
• Radio-frequency dressed state potentials for neutral atoms
• Ultracold atoms confined in rf-induced two-dimensional trapping potentials
• State-dependent, addressable subwavelength lattices with cold atoms
• Dissipative Quantum Ising model in a cold atomic spin-boson mixture
• Bose-Einstein condensates in RF-dressed adiabatic potentials
• Atoms in a radiofrequency-dressed optical lattice
• Versatile transporter apparatus for experiments with optically trapped Bose-Einstein condensates
• Observations of $\lambda /4$ structure in a low-loss radiofrequency-dressed optical lattice

Cited by in corpus (7)

• Dynamics of Matter-Wave Quantum Emitters in a Structured Vacuum
• Formation of Matter-Wave Polaritons in an Optical Lattice
• Analysis of non-Markovian coupling of a lattice-trapped atom to free space
• Super- and subradiant dynamics of quantum emitters mediated by atomic matter waves
• Robust field-dressed spectra of diatomics in an optical lattice
• In-situ magnetometry for experiments with atomic quantum gases
• Two-Body Kapitza-Dirac Scattering of One-Dimensional Ultracold Atoms