Vortex Formation in Quench-Cooled Superfluid Phase Transition

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Abstract
We use the absorption reaction of a thermal neutron in rotating 3He-B to heat locally a 10 micrometer -size volume into normal phase. When the heated region cools back in microseconds, vortex lines are formed. We record with NMR the number of lines as a function of superflow velocity and compare to the Kibble-Zurek theory of vortex-loop freeze-out from a random network of defects, which is formed in the rapid transition. The measurements confirm the calculated loop-size distribution and show that the same mechanism explains the A to B transition in supercooled neutron-irradiated 3He-A.

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