In a Bose-Einstein condensate, a cloud of atoms is cooled to
temperatures a few billionths of a degree above absolute zero, at
which point the quantum mechanical waves of the atoms can merge. The
result is a coherent cloud of atoms that acts like a single
macroscopic particle but obeys the microscopic laws of quantum
physics.
The two most-cited papers in Bose-Einstein condensates detail the
1995 research that led to the 2001 Nobel Prize in physics going to
Eric Cornell, Carl Weiman, and Wolfgang
Ketterle [see
also] [see
also]. These papers report on the creation of the first ever
Bose-Einstein Condensates—in rubidium atoms and sodium atoms. The
next paper in the top 20 describes the creation of a Bose-Einstein
condensate in lithium atoms.
The remainder of the top 20 is devoted primarily to reporting on
the remarkable phenomena that have been created in the Bose-Einstein
condensates since 1995. These include the interference and
amplification of coherent matter waves, pulsed atom lasers, collective
excitations, oscillations, and vortices. Other top 20 papers report on
improved techniques for confining Bose-Einstein condensates in
magnetic traps and on the theory and behavior of the condensates.
Methodology
To construct this database, papers
were extracted based on title and author-supplied keywords for
Bose-Einstein Condensates. The keywords used were as follows:
bose-einstein
conden*
The baseline time span for this database
is 1993 - 2003 (fifth bimonthly). The resulting database contained 3,539 papers;
3,585 authors; 68 countries; 236 journals; and 1,061 institutions. Read the methodology used to create this
special topic.
Rankings
Once the database was in place,
it was used to generate the lists of top 20 papers, authors, journals,
institutions, and nations, covering a time span of 1993-2003 (fifth
bimonthly).
The top 20 papers are ranked according to total cites. Rankings for author, journal, institution, and country are listed in three ways: according to total cites, total papers, and total cites/paper. The paper thresholds used to determine scientist, institution, country, and journal rankings according to total cites/paper were as follows:
23, 32, 13, and 30, respectively. These thresholds correspond to the top 1% of authors,
1% of institutions, 50% of countries and 10% of journals by total papers.
