title: Persistent currents in spinor condensates.
abstract: We create and study persistent currents in a toroidal two-component Bose gas, consisting of 87Rb atoms in two different spin states. For a large spin-population imbalance we observe supercurrents persisting for over two minutes. However, we find that the supercurrent is unstable for spin polarization below a well-defined critical value. We also investigate the role of phase coherence between the two spin components and show that only the magnitude of the spin-polarization vector, rather than its orientation in spin space, is relevant for supercurrent stability.
authors: Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, J. J. Thomson Avenue, Cambridge CB3 0HE, United Kingdom.
authors: Scott
authors: S
authors: Beattie
authors: Stuart
authors: S
authors: Moulder
authors: Richard J
authors: RJ
authors: Fletcher
authors: Zoran
authors: Z
authors: Hadzibabic