Paper detail

Spatial coherence of spin-orbit-coupled Bose gases

Spin-orbit-coupled Bose-Einstein condensates (SOBECs) exhibit two new phases of matter, now known as the stripe and plane-wave phases. When two interacting spin components of a SOBEC spatially overlap, density modulations with periodicity given by the spin-orbit coupling strength appear. In equilibrium, these components fully overlap in the miscible stripe phase, and overlap only in a domain wall in the immiscible plane-wave phase. Here we probe the density modulation present in any overlapping region with optical Bragg scattering, and observe the sudden drop of Bragg scattering as the overlapping region shrinks. Using an atomic analogue of the Talbot effect, we demonstrate the existence of long-range coherence between the different spin components in the stripe phase and surprisingly even in the phase-separated plane-wave phase.