Dr Amruta Gadge creates fifth state of matter from her living room

Dr Amruta Gadge from the Quantum Systems and Devices Laboratory successfully created a Bose-Einstein Condensate using quantum technology based at the University of Sussex. She is an ex-student of St. Xavier’s College Mumbai. She graduated with Physics in 2009 and topped the Mumbai University in Physics. She did her masters from the University of Pune and later acquired a PhD from Nottingham University in the UK. She also has experience of working at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai.

On 23rd March 2020, when the Government of the United Kingdom declared complete lockdown, the residents were forced to sit at home. They had nowhere. However, the Quantum Systems and Devices Laboratory was not ready to give up just yet. Every student, intern and worker started experimenting while staying at home.

Although it was impossible to transfer the important set-ups, large machines and complex lasers at home from the labs, Dr. Gadge living just two miles away from the lab did something incredible. She researched, confirmed and experimented the existence of BEC.

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BEC, Bose-Einstein Condensate was first proposed by Albert Einstein in 1925 and then implemented by Satyendra Nath Bose in 1990s. The BEC was produced in high facility labs during that time but it didn’t seem reasonable to do it remotely. This was falsified by Dr Amruta when she produced BEC in her living room without the use of major types of equipment.

To achieve this, the team had to develop various monitoring systems to keep track of every important parameter like vacuum pressure, temperatures, etc. The degree of automation achieved made it possible to perform the complex sequence of the cooling stages remotely from home to reach temperatures leading to a BEC. Researchers claim that enhancing the capabilities of remote lab control is relevant for research applications aimed at operating quantum technology in inaccessible environments such as space, underground, in a submarine, or in extreme climates.

A BEC is formed by cooling a gas of extremely low density (about one-hundred-thousandth (1/100,000) the density of normal air) to ultra-low temperatures.

Once again a woman has proved that nothing is impossible when done with utmost dedication and hard work. All we need is to believe that we can and we will! 

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