Giant Vortex Clusters in a Two-Dimensional Quantum Fluid
Abstract
Adding energy to a system through transient stirring usually leads to more disorder. In contrast, point-like vortices in a bounded two-dimensional fluid are predicted to reorder above a certain energy, forming persistent vortex clusters. Here we realize experimentally these vortex clusters in a planar superfluid: a Rb Bose-Einstein condensate confined to an elliptical geometry. We demonstrate that the clusters persist for long times, maintaining the superfluid system in a high energy state far from global equilibrium. Our experiments explore a regime of vortex matter at negative absolute temperatures, and have relevance to the dynamics of topological defects, two-dimensional turbulence, and systems such as helium films, nonlinear optical materials, fermion superfluids, and quark-gluon plasmas.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1801.06951,
title = {Giant Vortex Clusters in a Two-Dimensional Quantum Fluid},
author = {Guillaume Gauthier and Matthew T. Reeves and Xiaoquan Yu and Ashton S. Bradley and Mark Baker and Thomas A. Bell and Halina Rubinsztein-Dunlop and Matthew J. Davis and Tyler W. Neely},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1801.06951},
year = {2020}
}
Comments
14 pages, 4 Figures, 9 Supplemental Figures. The definitive version of this article was published in Science Vol. 364, Issue 6447, pp. 1264-1267, 28 Jun 2019. doi:10.1126/science.aat5718