# Publications by Robert Smith

## Can three-body recombination purify a quantum gas?

Physical Review Letters American Physical Society (2019)

LH Dogra, JAP Glidden, TA Hilker, C Eigen, EA Cornell, RP Smith, Z Hadzibabic

Three-body recombination in quantum gases is traditionally associated with heating, but it was recently found that it can also cool the gas. We show thatin a partially condensed three-dimensional homogeneous Bose gas three-body loss could even purify the sample, that is, reduce the entropy per particle and increase the condensed fraction $\eta$. We predict that the evolution of $\eta$ under continuous three-body loss can, depending on small changes in the initial conditions, exhibit two qualitatively different behaviours - if it is initially above a certain critical value, $\eta$ increases further, whereas clouds with lower initial $\eta$ evolve towards a thermal gas. These dynamical effects should be observable under realistic experimental conditions.

Show full publication list