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Superradiant light scattering from a moving Bose-Einstein condensate

R. Bonifacio·F. S. Cataliotti·M. Cola·L. Fallani·C. Fort·N. Piovella·M. Inguscio
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Abstract

We investigate the interaction of a moving BEC with a far detuned laser beam. Superradiant Rayleigh scattering arises from the spontaneous formation of a matter-wave grating due to the interference of two wavepackets with different momenta. The system is described by the CARL-BEC model which is a generalization of the Gross-Pitaevskii model to include the self-consistent evolution of the scattered field. The experiment gives evidence of a damping of the matter-wave grating which depends on the initial velocity of the condensate. We describe this damping in terms of a phase-diffusion decoherence process, in good agreement with the experimental results.

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R. Bonifacio, F. S. Cataliotti, M. Cola, L. Fallani, C. Fort, N. Piovella, M. Inguscio. 2003-09-22. Superradiant light scattering from a moving Bose-Einstein condensate. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.optcom.2004.01.027

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