title: Bright solitonic matter-wave interferometer.
abstract: We present the first realization of a solitonic atom interferometer. A Bose-Einstein condensate of 1×10(4) atoms of rubidium-85 is loaded into a horizontal optical waveguide. Through the use of a Feshbach resonance, the s-wave scattering length of the 85Rb atoms is tuned to a small negative value. This attractive atomic interaction then balances the inherent matter-wave dispersion, creating a bright solitonic matter wave. A Mach-Zehnder interferometer is constructed by driving Bragg transitions with the use of an optical lattice colinear with the waveguide. Matter-wave propagation and interferometric fringe visibility are compared across a range of s-wave scattering values including repulsive, attractive and noninteracting values. The solitonic matter wave is found to significantly increase fringe visibility even compared with a noninteracting cloud.
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: G D
authors.initials: GD
authors.lastname: McDonald
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: C C N
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Kuhn
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: K S
authors.initials: KS
authors.lastname: Hardman
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bennetts
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: P J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Everitt
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: P A
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Altin
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: J E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Debs
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: J D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Close
authors.affiliation: Quantum Sensors and Atomlaser Lab, Department of Quantum Science, Australian National University, Canberra 0200, Australia.
authors.forename: N P
authors.initials: NP
authors.lastname: Robins