Interferometric determination of the s and d-wave scattering amplitudes in 87Rb.

We demonstrate an interference method to determine the low-energy elastic scattering amplitudes of a quantum gas. We linearly accelerate two ultracold atomic clouds up to energies of 1.2 mK and observe the collision halo by direct imaging in free space. From the interference between s- and d- partial waves in the differential scattering pattern we extract the corresponding phase shifts. The method does not require knowledge of the atomic density. This allows us to infer accurate values for the s- and d-wave scattering amplitudes from the zero-energy limit up to the first Ramsauer minimum using only the van der Waals C6 coefficient as theoretical input. For the 87Rb triplet potential, the method reproduces the scattering length with an accuracy of 6%.

Bose-Einstein condensation into nonequilibrium States studied by condensate focusing.

We report the formation of Bose-Einstein condensates into nonequilibrium states. Our condensates are much longer than equilibrium condensates with the same number of atoms, show strong phase fluctuations, and have a dynamical evolution similar to that of quadrupole shape oscillations of regular condensates. The condensates emerge in elongated traps as the result of local thermalization when the nucleation time is short compared to the axial oscillation time. We introduce condensate focusing as a new method to extract the phase-coherence length of Bose-Einstein condensates.