Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas
Heat transport is a fundamental property of all physical systems and can serve as a fingerprint identifying different states of matter. In a normal liquid a hot spot diffuses while in a superfluid heat propagates as a wave called second sound. Despite its importance for understanding quantum mater...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en_US |
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American Association for the Advancement of Science
2024
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/153480 |
| _version_ | 1826214027072634880 |
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| author | Yan, Zhenjie Patel, Parth B. Mukherjee, Biswaroop Vale, Chris J. Fletcher, Richard J. Zwierlein, Martin |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics Yan, Zhenjie Patel, Parth B. Mukherjee, Biswaroop Vale, Chris J. Fletcher, Richard J. Zwierlein, Martin |
| author_sort | Yan, Zhenjie |
| collection | MIT |
| description | Heat transport is a fundamental property of all physical systems and can serve as a fingerprint identifying different
states of matter. In a normal liquid a hot spot diffuses while in a superfluid heat propagates as a wave called
second sound. Despite its importance for understanding quantum materials, direct imaging of heat transport is
challenging, and one usually resorts to detecting secondary effects, such as changes in density or pressure. Here
we establish thermography of a strongly interacting atomic Fermi gas, a paradigmatic system whose properties
relate to strongly correlated electrons, nuclear matter and neutron stars. Just as the color of a glowing metal
reveals its temperature, the radiofrequency spectrum of the interacting Fermi gas provides spatially resolved
thermometry with sub-nanokelvin resolution. The superfluid phase transition is directly observed as the sudden
change from thermal diffusion to second sound propagation, and is accompanied by a peak in the second sound
diffusivity. The method yields the full heat and density response of the strongly interacting Fermi gas, and therefore
all defining properties of Landau’s two-fluid hydrodynamics. Our measurements serve as a benchmark for
theories of transport in strongly interacting fermionic matter. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:58:38Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/153480 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | en_US |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:58:38Z |
| publishDate | 2024 |
| publisher | American Association for the Advancement of Science |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1534802024-02-09T03:05:36Z Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas Yan, Zhenjie Patel, Parth B. Mukherjee, Biswaroop Vale, Chris J. Fletcher, Richard J. Zwierlein, Martin Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Research Laboratory of Electronics Heat transport is a fundamental property of all physical systems and can serve as a fingerprint identifying different states of matter. In a normal liquid a hot spot diffuses while in a superfluid heat propagates as a wave called second sound. Despite its importance for understanding quantum materials, direct imaging of heat transport is challenging, and one usually resorts to detecting secondary effects, such as changes in density or pressure. Here we establish thermography of a strongly interacting atomic Fermi gas, a paradigmatic system whose properties relate to strongly correlated electrons, nuclear matter and neutron stars. Just as the color of a glowing metal reveals its temperature, the radiofrequency spectrum of the interacting Fermi gas provides spatially resolved thermometry with sub-nanokelvin resolution. The superfluid phase transition is directly observed as the sudden change from thermal diffusion to second sound propagation, and is accompanied by a peak in the second sound diffusivity. The method yields the full heat and density response of the strongly interacting Fermi gas, and therefore all defining properties of Landau’s two-fluid hydrodynamics. Our measurements serve as a benchmark for theories of transport in strongly interacting fermionic matter. 2024-02-08T22:40:56Z 2024-02-08T22:40:56Z 2024-02-08 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/153480 Zhenjie Yan et al. ,Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas.Science383,629-633(2024). en_US Science Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ application/pdf American Association for the Advancement of Science MIT News Office |
| spellingShingle | Yan, Zhenjie Patel, Parth B. Mukherjee, Biswaroop Vale, Chris J. Fletcher, Richard J. Zwierlein, Martin Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas |
| title | Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas |
| title_full | Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas |
| title_fullStr | Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas |
| title_full_unstemmed | Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas |
| title_short | Thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting Fermi gas |
| title_sort | thermography of the superfluid transition in a strongly interacting fermi gas |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/153480 |
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