Nonadiabatic unitary evolution with tailored time-dependent Hamiltonians can prepare systems of cold-atomic gases with various desired properties such as low excess energies. For a system of two one-dimensional quasicondensates coupled with a time-varying tunneling amplitude, we show that the optimal protocol, for maximizing any figure of merit in a given time, is bang-bang, i.e., the coupling alternates between only two values through a sequence of sudden quenches. Minimizing the energy of one of the quasicondensates with such a nonadiabatic protocol, and then decoupling it at the end of the process, can result in effective cooling beyond the current state of the art. Our cooling method can be potentially applied to arbitrary systems through an integration of the experiment with simulated annealing computations.

• Received 18 October 2012

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.87.043607