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| Author(s): |
Sérgio Ricardo Muniz
Total Authors: 1
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| Document type: | Doctoral Thesis |
| Press: | São Carlos. |
| Institution: | Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Instituto de Física de São Carlos (IFSC/BT) |
| Defense date: | 2002-09-25 |
| Examining board members: |
Vanderlei Salvador Bagnato;
Claudio Lenz Cesar;
Luiz Davidovich;
Gil da Costa Marques;
Daniel Pereira
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| Advisor: | Vanderlei Salvador Bagnato |
| Abstract | |
We present here all the experimental development obtained in São Carlos to produce and study quantum degenerate gases, aiming specially the realization of Bose-Einstein Condensation (BEC) in sodium (Na-23) atoms. In order to do that we designed, built and completely integrated a complex experimental setup which conjugates most of the techniques developed along the last decades to produce cold atoms: atomic beam slowing, magnetic and magneto-optical trapping, optical sub-Doppler cooling, forced evaporative cooling induced by radio-frequency (RF), controlling of high gradient and curvature magnetic fields for atom trapping and the image acquisition and processing of atomic samples near absolute zero temperatures. During this period we did the first and most important step, also the most difficult, of our current project to study quantum gases, which was the development and realization of all the experimental apparatus. However, this work is not just about instrumentation, and along the way we also did important scientific contributions to the cold atom field, as whole. These contributions resulted in several publications, listed in appendix III, but they do not constitute the focus of this work, which main goal is the study of macroscopically quantum degenerate gases. (AU) | |