arXiv subjects

P. B. Blakie

Publications and source records attributed to P. B. Blakie.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2013

Roton excitations in a trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate

We consider the quasi-particle excitations of a trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate. By mapping these excitations onto radial and angular momentum we show that the roton modes are clearly revealed as discrete fingers in parameter space, whereas the other modes form a smooth surface. We examine the properties of the roton modes and characterize how they change with the dipole interaction strength. We demonstrate how the application of a perturbing potential can be used to engineer angular rotons, i.e. allowing us to controllably select modes of non-zero angular momentum to become the lowest energy rotons.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2013

Numerical method for the stochastic projected Gross-Pitaevskii equation

We present a method for solving the stochastic projected Gross-Pitaevskii equation (SPGPE) for a three-dimensional Bose gas in a harmonic-oscillator trapping potential. The SPGPE contains the challenge of both accurately evolving all modes in the low energy classical region of the system, and evaluating terms from the number-conserving scattering reservoir process. We give an accurate and efficient procedure for evaluating the scattering terms using a Hermite-polynomial based spectral-Galerkin representation, which allows us to precisely implement the low energy mode restriction. Stochastic integration is performed using the weak semi-implicit Euler method. We extensively characterize the accuracy of our method, finding a faster than expected rate of stochastic convergence. Physical consistency of the algorithm is demonstrated by considering thermalization of initially random states.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2013

Depletion and fluctuations of a trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate in the roton regime

We consider the non-condensate density and density fluctuations of a trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate, focusing on the regime where a roton-like excitation spectrum develops. Our results show that a characteristic peak in the non-condensate density occurs at trap center due to the rotons. In this regime we also find that the anomalous density becomes positive and peaked, giving rise to enhanced density fluctuations. We calculate the non-condensate density in momentum space and show that a small momentum halo is associated with the roton excitations.

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arXiv2013

Fingerprinting Rotons in a Dipolar Condensate: Super-Poissonian Peak in the Atom-Number Fluctuations

We demonstrate that measurements of atom-number fluctuations in a trapped dipolar condensate can reveal the presence of the elusive roton excitation. The key signature is a super-Poissonian peak in the fluctuations as the size of the measurement cell is varied, with the maximum occurring when the size is comparable to the roton wavelength. The magnitude of this roton feature is enhanced with temperature. The variation in fluctuations across the condensate demonstrates that the roton excitations are effectively confined to propagate in the densest central region, realizing a density trapped roton gas. While our main results are based on full numerical solutions of the meanfield equations, we also develop and validate a simple local density theory. Finally, we consider fluctuations measured within a washer-shaped cell which filters out the contribution of modes with nonzero angular momentum and provides a signal sensitive to individual roton modes.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

Stability and structure of an anisotropically trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate: angular and linear rotons

We study theoretically Bose-Einstein condensates with polarized dipolar interactions in anisotropic traps. We map the parameter space by varying the trap frequencies and dipolar interaction strengths and find an irregular-shaped region of parameter space in which density-oscillating condensate states occur, with maximum density away from the trap center. These density-oscillating states may be biconcave (red-blood-cell-shaped), or have two or four peaks. For all trap frequencies, the condensate becomes unstable to collapse for sufficiently large dipole interaction strength. The collapse coincides with the softening of an elementary excitation. When the condensate mode is density-oscillating, the character of the softening excitation is related to the structure of the condensate. We classify these excitations by linear and angular characteristics. We also find excited solutions to the Gross-Pitaevskii equation, which are always unstable.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

The stochastic projected Gross-Pitaevskii equation

We have achieved the first full implementation of the stochastic projected Gross-Pitaevskii equation for a three-dimensional trapped Bose gas at finite temperature. Our work advances previous applications of this theory, which have only included growth processes, by implementing number-conserving scattering processes. We evaluate an analytic expression for the coefficient of the scattering term and compare it to that of the growth term in the experimental regime, showing the two coefficients are comparable in size. We give an overview of the numerical implementation of the deterministic and stochastic terms for the scattering process, and use simulations of a condensate excited into a large amplitude breathing mode oscillation to characterize the importance of scattering and growth processes in an experimentally accessible regime. We find that in such non-equilibrium regimes the scattering can dominate over the growth, leading to qualitatively different system dynamics. In particular, the scattering causes the system to rapidly reach thermal equilibrium without greatly depleting the condensate, suggesting that it provides a highly coherent energy transfer mechanism.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

Finite-temperature trapped dipolar Bose gas

We develop a finite temperature Hartree theory for the trapped dipolar Bose gas. We use this theory to study thermal effects on the mechanical stability of the system and density oscillating condensate states. We present results for the stability phase diagram as a function of temperature and aspect ratio. In oblate traps above the critical temperature for condensation we find that the Hartree theory predicts significant stability enhancement over the semiclassical result. Below the critical temperature we find that thermal effects are well described by accounting for the thermal depletion of the condensate. Our results also show that density oscillating condensate states occur over a range of interaction strengths that broadens with increasing temperature.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

Magnetostriction and exchange effects in trapped dipolar Bose and Fermi gases

We examine the magnetostrictive position and momentum space distortions that occur in harmonically confined dipolar Bose and Fermi gases. Direct interactions give rise to position space magnetostriction and exchange interactions give rise to momentum space magnetostriction. While the position space magnetostriction is similar in Bose and Fermi systems, the momentum space magnetostriction is markedly different: the Bose gas momentum distribution distorts in the opposite sense to that of the Fermi gas. By relating exchange effects to short range correlations between the particles we discuss the energetic origin of this difference. Our main calculations are based on Hartree-Fock theory, but we also provide analytic approximations for the magnetostriction effects at zero and finite temperature. Our predictions should be verifiable in current experiments with ultra-cold polar molecules.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

A local exchange theory for trapped dipolar gases

We develop a practical Hartree-Fock theory for trapped Bose and Fermi gases that interact with dipole-dipole interactions. This theory is applicable at zero and finite temperature. Our approach is based on the introduction of local momentum distortion fields that characterize the exchange effects in terms of a local effective potential. We validate our theory against existing theories, finding excellent agreement with full Hartree-Fock calculations.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

Roton spectroscopy in a harmonically trapped dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate

We study a harmonically trapped Bose-Einstein condensate with dipole-dipole interactions in a regime where a roton spectrum emerges. We show that the roton spectrum is clearly revealed in the static and dynamic structure factors which can be measured using Bragg spectroscopy. We develop and validate a theory based on the local density approximation for the dynamic structure factor.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2012

Yang-Yang thermometry and momentum distribution of a trapped one-dimensional Bose gas

We describe the use of the exact Yang-Yang solutions for the one-dimensional Bose gas to enable accurate kinetic-energy thermometry based on the root-mean-square width of an experimentally measured momentum distribution. Furthermore, we use the stochastic projected Gross-Pitaevskii theory to provide the first quantitative description of the full momentum distribution measurements of Van Amerongen et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 100, 090402 (2008). We find the fitted temperatures from the stochastic projected Gross-Pitaevskii approach are in excellent agreement with those determined by Yang-Yang kinetic-energy thermometry.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2011

Quasicondensation and coherence in the quasi-two-dimensional trapped Bose gas

We simulate a trapped quasi-two-dimensional Bose gas using a classical field method. To interpret our results we identify the uniform Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) temperature $T_{BKT}$ as where the system phase space density satisfies a critical value. We observe that density fluctuations are suppressed in the system well above $T_{BKT}$ when a quasi-condensate forms as the first occurrence of degeneracy. At lower temperatures, but still above $T_{BKT}$, we observe the development of appreciable coherence as a prominent finite-size effect, which manifests as bimodality in the momentum distribution of the system. At $T_{BKT}$ algebraic decay of off-diagonal correlations occurs near the trap center with an exponent of 0.25, as expected for the uniform system. Our results characterize the low temperature phase diagram for a trapped quasi-2D Bose gas and are consistent with observations made in recent experiments.

cond-mat.other↗

arXiv2011

Direct Simulation Monte Carlo method for cold atom dynamics: classical Boltzmann equation in the quantum collision regime

In this paper we develop a direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) method for simulating highly nonequilibrium dynamics of nearly degenerate ultra-cold gases. We show that our method can simulate the high-energy collision of two thermal clouds in the regime observed in experiments [Thomas, et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. \textbf{93}, 173201 (2004)], which requires the inclusion of beyond s-wave scattering. We also consider the long-time dynamics of this system, demonstrating that this would be a practical experimental scenario for testing the Boltzmann equation and studying rethermalization.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2011

Finite temperature stability of a trapped dipolar Bose gas

We calculate the stability diagram for a trapped normal Bose gas with dipole-dipole interactions. Our study characterizes the roles of trap geometry, temperature, and short-ranged interactions on the stability. We predict a robust double instability feature in oblate trapping geometries arising from the interplay of thermal gas saturation and the anisotropy of the interaction. Our results are relevant to current experiments with polar molecules and will be useful in developing strategies to obtain a polar molecule Bose-Einstein condensate.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2011

Suppression of Kelvon-induced decay of quantized vortices in oblate Bose-Einstein Condensates

We study the Kelvin mode excitations on a vortex line in a three-dimensional trapped Bose-Einstein condensate at finite temperature. Our stochastic Gross-Pitaevskii simulations show that the activation of these modes can be suppressed by tightening the confinement along the direction of the vortex line, leading to a strong suppression in the vortex decay rate as the system enters a regime of two-dimensional vortex dynamics. As the system approaches the condensation transition temperature we find that the vortex decay rate is strongly sensitive to dimensionality and temperature, observing a large enhancement for quasi-two-dimensional traps. Three-dimensional simulations of the recent vortex dipole decay experiment of Neely et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 160401 (2010)] confirm two-dimensional vortex dynamics, and predict a dipole lifetime consistent with experimental observations and suppression of Kelvon-induced vortex decay in highly oblate condensates.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2010

Thermally induced coherence in a Mott insulator of bosonic atoms

Conventional wisdom is that increasing temperature causes quantum coherence to decrease. Using finite temperature perturbation theory and exact calculations for the strongly correlated bosonic Mott insulating state we show a practical counter-example that can be explored in optical lattice experiments: the short-range coherence of the Mott insulating phase can increase substantially with increasing temperature. We demonstrate that this phenomenon originates from thermally produced defects that can tunnel with ease. Since the near zero temperature coherence properties have been measured with high precision we expect these results to be verifiable in current experiments.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2010

Thermodynamics and coherence of a trapped dipolar Fermi gas

We develop a meanfield treatment of a polarized trapped Fermi gas with dipole-dipole interactions. Our approach is based on self-consistent semiclassical Hartree-Fock theory that accounts for direct and exchange interactions. We discuss our procedure for numerically implementing the calculation. We study the thermodynamic and the first and second order correlation properties of the system. We find that the system entropy depends on the trap geometry, allowing the system to be cooled as the trap aspect ratio is increased, and that exchange interactions cause the correlation functions to be anisotropic in the low temperature regime. We also find that many uniform gas thermodynamic predictions, for which direct interaction effects vanish, are qualitatively unreliable for trapped systems, most notably for oblate traps. We develop a simplified Hartree formalism that is applicable to anisotropic harmonic traps.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2010

Temporal coherence, anomalous moments, and pairing correlations in the classical-field description of a degenerate Bose gas

The coherence properties of degenerate Bose gases have usually been expressed in terms of spatial correlation functions, neglecting the rich information encoded in their temporal behavior. In this paper we show, using a Hamiltonian classical-field formalism, that temporal correlations can be used to characterize familiar properties of a finite-temperature degenerate Bose gas. The temporal coherence of a Bose-Einstein condensate is limited only by the slow diffusion of its phase, and thus the presence of a condensate is indicated by a sharp feature in the temporal power spectrum of the field. We show that the condensate mode can be obtained by averaging the field for a short time in an appropriate phase-rotating frame, and that for a wide range of temperatures, the condensate obtained in this approach agrees well with that defined by the Penrose-Onsager criterion based on one-body (spatial) correlations. For time periods long compared to the phase diffusion time, the field will average to zero, as we would expect from the overall U(1) symmetry of the Hamiltonian. We identify the emergence of the first moment on short time scales with the concept of U(1) symmetry breaking that is central to traditional mean-field theories of Bose condensation. We demonstrate that the short-time averaging procedure constitutes a general analog of the 'anomalous' averaging operation of symmetry-broken theories by calculating the anomalous thermal density of the field, which we find to have form and temperature dependence consistent with the results of mean-field theories.

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