Final Report: Fundamental Issues in Non-Equilibrium Dynamics

The Hulet group is exploring spin-charge separation in a one-dimensional (1D) interacting Fermigas. Spin-charge separation is the prediction that the charge of an electron will exhibit a faster speed of sound than the spin part of the electron. This remarkable effect is one of the most distinct manifestations of strong correlated matter. Although qualitatively observed in condensed matter, quantitative confirmation of the Tomonaga-Luttinger Liquid (TLL) theory has not yet been achieved. Our goals are to measure the speed of sound of both the charge mode and the spin mode as a function of the strength of the repulsive interactions between spin up and spin down fermions in order to test the TLL theory. We will use the Bragg spectroscopy method to measure the dynamic structure factor S(q, k) of both modes.