No Arabic abstract
We consider a two-component Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) in a ring trap in a rotating frame, and show how to determine the response of such a configuration to being in a rotating frame, via accumulation of a Sagnac phase. This may be accomplished either through population oscillations, or the motion of spatial density fringes. We explicitly include the effect of interactions via a mean-field description, and study the fidelity of the dynamics relative to an ideal configuration.
We experimentally investigate the dynamics of spin solitary waves (magnetic solitons) in a harmonically trapped, binary superfluid mixture. We measure the in-situ density of each pseudospin component and their relative local phase via an interferometric technique we developed, and as such, fully characterise the magnetic solitons while they undergo oscillatory motion in the trap. Magnetic solitons exhibit non-dispersive, dissipationless long-time dynamics. By imprinting multiple magnetic solitons in our ultracold gas sample, we engineer binary collisions between solitons of either same or opposite magnetisation and map out their trajectories.
We present a self-consistent study of coherently coupled two-component Bose-Einstein condensates. Finite spin-flipping coupling changes the first order demixing phase transition for Bose-Bose mixtures to a second order phase transition between an unpolarized and a polarized state. We analise the excitation spectrum and the structure factor along the transition for a homogeneous system. We discuss the main differences at the transition between a coherent coupled gas and a two-component mixture. We finally study the ground state when spin-(in)dependent trapping potentials are added to the system, focusing on optical lattices, which give rise to interesting new configurations.
The miscibility of two interacting quantum systems is an important testing ground for the understanding of complex quantum systems. Two-component Bose-Einstein condensates enable the investigation of this scenario in a particularly well controlled setting. In a homogeneous system, the transition between mixed and separated phases is fully characterised by a `miscibility parameter, based on the ratio of intra- to inter-species interaction strengths. Here we show, however, that this parameter is no longer the optimal one for trapped gases, for which the location of the phase boundary depends critically on atom numbers. We demonstrate how monitoring of damping rates and frequencies of dipole oscillations enables the experimental mapping of the phase diagram by numerical implementation of a fully self-consistent finite-temperature kinetic theory for binary condensates. The change in damping rate is explained in terms of surface oscillation in the immiscible regime, and counterflow instability in the miscible regime, with collisions becoming only important in the long time evolution.
We investigate the mean--field equilibrium solutions for a two--species immiscible Bose--Einstein condensate confined by a harmonic confinement with additional linear perturbations. We observe a range of equilibrium density structures, including `ball and shell formations and axially/radially separated states, with a marked sensitivity to the potential perturbations and the relative atom number in each species. Incorporation of linear trap perturbations, albeit weak, are found to be essential to match the range of equilibrium density profiles observed in a recent Rb-87 - Cs-133 Bose-Einstein condensate experiment [D. J. McCarron et al., Phys. Rev. A, 84, 011603(R) (2011)]. Our analysis of this experiment demonstrates that sensitivity to linear trap perturbations is likely to be important factor in interpreting the results of similar experiments in the future.
Equilibrium vortex formation in rotating binary Bose gases with a rotating frequency higher than the harmonic trapping frequency is investigated theoretically. We consider the system being evaporatively cooled to form condensates and a combined numerical scheme is applied to ensure the binary system being in an authentic equilibrium state. To keep the system stable against the large centrifugal force of ultrafast rotation, a quartic trapping potential is added to the existing harmonic part. Using the Thomas-Fermi approximation, a critical rotating frequency Omega_c is derived, which characterizes the structure with or without a central density hole. Vortex structures are studied in detail with rotation frequency both above and below ?Omega_c and with respect to the miscible, symmetrically separated, and asymmetrically separated phases in their nonrotating ground-state counterparts.