Spin-Injection Spectroscopy of a Spin-Orbit Coupled Fermi Gas
Author(s)
Cheuk, Lawrence W.; Sommer, Ariel Tjodolv; Hadzibabic, Zoran; Yefsah, Tarik; Zwierlein, Martin Wolfram; Bakr, Waseem S; ... Show more Show less
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The coupling of the spin of electrons to their motional state lies at the heart of recently discovered topological phases of matter. Here we create and detect spin-orbit coupling in an atomic Fermi gas, a highly controllable form of quantum degenerate matter. We directly reveal the spin-orbit gap via spin-injection spectroscopy, which characterizes the energy-momentum dispersion and spin composition of the quantum states. For energies within the spin-orbit gap, the system acts as a spin diode. We also create a spin-orbit coupled lattice and probe its spinful band structure, which features additional spin gaps and a fully gapped spectrum. In the presence of s-wave interactions, such systems should display induced p-wave pairing, topological superfluidity, and Majorana edge states.
Date issued
2012-08Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Physics; Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Research Laboratory of Electronics; MIT-Harvard Center for Ultracold AtomsJournal
Physical Review Letters
Publisher
American Physical Society
Citation
Cheuk, Lawrence et al. “Spin-Injection Spectroscopy of a Spin-Orbit Coupled Fermi Gas.” Physical Review Letters 109.9 (2012). © 2012 American Physical Society
Version: Final published version
ISSN
0031-9007
1079-7114