ULTRACOLD ATOM TALK

'Chaos and Quantum Thermalization'

Abstract:

The tremendous experimental progress in cooling, isolating and controlling atomic gases seen during the last decade has spured new light on old questions in quantum many-body theory. One example is that of thermalization in closed quantum systems; which systems will thermalize and what is then the mechanism behind such equilibration? A common wisdom is that non-integrability or chaos is a prerequisite for quantum thermalization. In this talk I will try to convince you that such believes can be problematic. Before doing so I will introduce some concepts and definitions of quantum chaos and thermalization as well as integrability. Following these more genral discussions I will consider two specific examples of spin-orbit coupled atomic condensates in order to visualize typical behaviours. This will bring us to the conclusion that a complete understanding of quantum thermalization or integrability is lacking.