Studies of spontaneous vortex formation during Bose-Einstein condensation.

We experimentally observe the spontaneous creation of quantized vortices in Bose-Einstein condensates during the BEC phase transition. Numerical simulations based on the Stochastic Gross-Pitaevskii equation formalism show excellent quantitative agreement with experimental results. We will present results of ongoing experiments characterizing spontaneous vortex formation in BECs created in various trap geometries, including multiply connected and nearly two-dimensional potential wells.