Heating a dipolar quantum fluid into a solid

Usually, increasing the temperature of a system leads to disorder but supersolids can show the opposite trend. Here, the authors discuss the observation of a supersolid phase in a dilute gas of dysprosium atoms by increasing their temperature. Raising the temperature of a material enhances the thermal motion of particles. Such an increase in thermal energy commonly leads to the melting of a solid into a fluid and eventually vaporises the liquid into a gaseous phase of matter. Here, we study the finite-temperature physics of dipolar quantum fluids and find surprising deviations from this general phenomenology. In particular, we describe how heating a dipolar superfluid from near-zero temperatures can induce a phase transition to a supersolid state with a broken translational symmetry. We discuss the observation of this effect in experiments on ultracold dysprosium atoms, which opens the door for exploring the unusual thermodynamics of dipolar quantum fluids.

Automated summary

Usually, increasing the temperature of a system leads to disorder but supersolids can show the opposite trend. Here, the authors discuss the observation of a supersolid phase in a dilute gas of dysprosium atoms by increasing their temperature. They find surprising deviations from the general phenomenology in the finite-temperature physics of dipolar quantum fluids and describe how heating a dipolar superfluid can induce a phase transition to a supersolid state with a broken translational symmetry. The observation of this effect in experiments on ultracold dysprosium atoms opens the door for exploring the unusual thermodynamics of dipolar quantum fluids.