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Updated: Jun 12, 2026

Thermocapillary Convection Space Experiment on the SJ-10 Recoverable Satellite
Published on: March 11, 2020
Bose-Einstein condensation in microgravity
T van Zoest1, N Gaaloul, Y Singh
1Institut für Quantenoptik, Leibniz Universität Hannover, Welfengarten 1, 30167 Hannover, Germany.
Abstract:
Albert Einstein's insight that it is impossible to distinguish a local experiment in a "freely falling elevator" from one in free space led to the development of the theory of general relativity. The wave nature of matter manifests itself in a striking way in Bose-Einstein condensates, where millions of atoms lose their identity and can be described by a single macroscopic wave function. We combine these two topics and report the preparation and observation of a Bose-Einstein condensate during free fall in a 146-meter-tall evacuated drop tower. During the expansion over 1 second, the atoms form a giant coherent matter wave that is delocalized on a millimeter scale, which represents a promising source for matter-wave interferometry to test the universality of free fall with quantum matter.
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