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Cold atoms stay cool

Nature Physics volume 17, pages 1294–1295 (2021)Cite this article

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Methods for studying Bose–Einstein condensation in ultracold gases have been under development for over 40 years. A highly sophisticated suite of techniques has emerged from rapid technological advances that show no sign of slowing down.

The sophistication of present experiments with ultracold gases would be inconceivable without the great instrumental advances following the discovery of Bose–Einstein condensation (BEC) in 19951,2. The first experiments were fascinating because of the BEC phenomenon itself. It took no more than a cloud of 1,000 trapped rubidium atoms and a good digital camera to observe the condensate as a distinct feature at the centre. Today, with the first condensate in space3, it is good to recall the advances that brought us here.

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  1. Van der Waals-Zeeman Institute, Institute of Physics, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Jook Walraven

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Correspondence to Jook Walraven.

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Walraven, J. Cold atoms stay cool. Nat. Phys. 17, 1294–1295 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-021-01453-3

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