Heat Death of an Ultracold Dipolar Gas

Graduate Thesis Or Dissertation

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Citeable URL: https://scholar.colorado.edu/concern/graduate_thesis_or_dissertations/7p88cj37d

Abstract

Optically trapping bulk gases of atoms and molecules at sub-microKelvin temperatures has become commonplace in several labs around the world. In particular, realizing low temperature samples of dipolar atoms and diatomic molecules has garnered great interest from the ultracold community, due to their long-range and anisotropic nature. At temperatures not yet low enough to achieve macroscopic quantum degeneracy, the gas constituents move about more or less classically, but experience collisions that can only be described accurately with quantum mechanics. By aligning these dipoles with an external field, collisions inherit highly anisotropic cross sections from their dipole-dipole interactions, leading to a wealth of tunable anisotropic collective dynamics.

I focus on characterizing anisotropic thermalization dynamics, which bears importance in many experimental applications. In fact, progressing in parallel with my graduate work has been exciting experiments with ultracold dipolar atoms and molecules. I tell the story of several collaborations in which my work was used to determine the scattering length of erbium atoms, characterize universal dipolar scattering, and open opportunities for optimal evaporative cooling of molecular gases. This thesis lays out the development of several theoretical tools for investigating the relaxation of a nondegenerate dipolar gas, tracking its intricate journey to an eventual heat death.

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