Motivated by recent experiments, we analyse the stability of a three-dimensional Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) loaded in a periodically driven one-dimensional optical lattice. Such periodically driven systems do not have a thermodynamic ground state
, but may have a long-lived steady state which is an eigenstate of a Floquet Hamiltonian. We explore collisional instabilities of the Floquet ground state which transfer energy into the transverse modes. We calculate decay rates, finding that the lifetime scales as the inverse square of the scattering length and inverse of the peak three- dimensional density. These rates can be controlled by adding additional transverse potentials.
We model the dynamics of condensation in a bimodal trap, consisting of a large reservoir region, and a tight dimple whose depth can be controlled. Experimental investigations have found that such dimple traps provide an efficient means of achieving c
ondensation. In our kinetic equations, we include two- and three-body processes. The two-body processes populate the dimple, and lead to loss when one of the colliding atoms is ejected from the trap. The three-body processes produce heating and loss. We explain the principal trends, give a detailed description of the dynamics, and provide quantitative predictions for timescales and condensate yields. From these simulations, we extract optimal parameters for future experiments.
We investigate the colour-magnitude relation of metal-poor globular clusters, the blue tilt, in the Hydra and Centaurus galaxy clusters and constrain the primordial conditions for star cluster self-enrichment. We analyse U,I photometry for about 2500
globular clusters in the central regions of Hydra and Centaurus, based on FORS1@VLT data. We convert the measured colour-magnitude relations into mass-metallicity space and obtain a scaling of Z propto M^{0.27 pm 0.05} for Centaurus GCs and Z propto M^{0.40 pm 0.06} for Hydra GCs, consistent with results in other environments. We find that the GC mass-metallicity relation already sets in at present-day masses of a few 10^5 solar masses and is well established in the luminosity range of massive MW clusters like omega Centauri. We compare the mass-metallicity relation with predictions from the star cluster self-enrichment model by Bailin & Harris (2009). For this we include effects of dynamical and stellar evolution and a physically well motivated primordial mass-radius scaling. The self-enrichment model reproduces the observed relations well for average primordial half-light radii r_h ~ 1-1.5 pc, star formation efficiencies f_* ~ 0.3-0.4, and pre-enrichment levels of [Fe/H] ~ -1.7 dex. Within the self-enrichment scenario, the observed blue tilt implies a correlation between GC mass and width of the stellar metallicity distribution. We find that this implied correlation matches the trend of width with GC mass measured in Galactic GCs, including extreme cases like omega Cen and M54. We conclude that 1. A primordial star cluster mass-radius relation provides a significant improvement to the self-enrichment model fits. 2. Broadenend metallicity distributions as found in some massive MW globular clusters may have arisen naturally from self-enrichment processes, without the need of a dwarf galaxy progenitor.
Motivated by recent experimental observations (C.V. Parker {it et al.}, Nature Physics, {bf 9}, 769 (2013)), we analyze the stability of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) in a one-dimensional lattice subjected to periodic shaking. In such a system the
re is no thermodynamic ground state, but there may be a long-lived steady-state, described as an eigenstate of a Floquet Hamiltonian. We calculate how scattering processes lead to a decay of the Floquet state. We map out the phase diagram of the system and find regions where the BEC is stable and regions where the BEC is unstable against atomic collisions. We show that Parker et al. perform their experiment in the stable region, which accounts for the long life-time of the condensate ($sim$ 1 second). We also estimate the scattering rate of the bosons in the region where the BEC is unstable.
We use variational methods to study a spin impurity in a 1D Bose lattice gas. Both in the strongly interacting superfluid regime and the Mott regime we find that the impurity binds with a hole, forming a polaron. Our calculations for the dispersion o
f the polaron are consistent with recent experiments by Fukuhara et. al. [Nature Phys. 9, 235 (2013)] and give a better understanding of their numerical simulations. We find that for sufficiently weak interactions there are ranges of momentum for which the polaron is unstable. We propose experimentally studying the stability of the polaron by measuring the correlation between the impurity and holes. We also study two interacting impurities, finding stable bipolarons for sufficiently strong interactions.
We calculate the effect of interactions on the expansion of ultracold atoms from a single site of an optical lattice. We use these results to predict how interactions influence the interference pattern observed in a time of flight experiment. We find
that for typical interaction strengths their influence is negligible, yet that they reduce visibility near a scattering resonance.
New cross sections for the reaction $ep to eeta p$ are reported for total center of mass energy $W$=1.5--2.3 GeV and invariant squared momentum transfer $Q^2$=0.13--3.3 GeV$^2$. This large kinematic range allows extraction of new information about re
sponse functions, photocouplings, and $eta N$ coupling strengths of baryon resonances. A sharp structure is seen at $Wsim$ 1.7 GeV. The shape of the differential cross section is indicative of the presence of a $P$-wave resonance that persists to high $Q^2$. Improved values are derived for the photon coupling amplitude for the $S_{11}$(1535) resonance. The new data greatly expands the $Q^2$ range covered and an interpretation of all data with a consistent parameterization is provided.
