Abstract
By using small inclusions of liquid 3He trapped in a solid 4He matrix, it may be possible to study a sample of the superfluid A phase in the regime where quantum fluctuations of the relative phase of the "up" and "down" Cooper pairs are no longer negligible. Under these conditions there is little doubt that a standard quantum-mechanical (QM) calculation of the NMR dynamics should correctly describe the behavior of the total magnetization of a large ensemble of independent inclusions. However, it is less obvious that it should describe the behavior of a single inclusion on a single run of the experiment, and indeed it is tempting to argue that a "spontaneous breaking of the symmetry" corresponding to the relative phase should occur, analogously to what (allegedly) happens in the interference of two independent Bose condensates. Here I argue that the prima facie analogy is misleading, and that the QM calculation indeed describes the behavior of a single inclusion.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 51-58 |
Number of pages | 8 |
Journal | Synthetic Metals |
Volume | 141 |
Issue number | 1-2 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Mar 18 2004 |
Keywords
- Nuclear magnetic resonance
- Superfluid He
- Ultra-small samples
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials
- Materials Chemistry
- Polymers and Plastics