Neutron Star Analogues in the Laboratory

Project Level: Honours/Masters

Neutron stars are astrophysical laboratories, realising extreme states of matter far beyond what might be created on Earth. Among the mysteries of neutron star behaviour are rotational glitches in radio pulsars – a sudden spin-up of the neutron star. Since direct observation of the microscopic processes leading to glitches is essentially impossible, laboratory analogues could favourably be used to elucidate the physics at work. This project will realise a laboratory neutron star by using a superfluid Bose-Einstein condensate. This system will be used to investigate depinning avalanches of quantised vortices – a key candidate mechanism in neutron star glitches.