The speed of sound of a Bose-Einstein condensate in an optical lattice is studied both analytically and numerically in all spatial three dimensions. Our investigation shows that the sound speed depends strongly on the strength of the lattice. In the one-dimensional case, the speed of sound falls monotonically with increasing lattice strength. The dependence on lattice strength becomes much richer in two and three dimensions. In the two-dimensional case, when the interaction is weak, the sound speed first increases and then decreases as the lattice strength increases. For the three-dimensional lattice, the sound speed can even oscillate with the lattice strength. These rich behaviors can be understood in terms of compressibility and effective mass. Our analytical results in the limit of weak lattices also offer an interesting perspective to help with our understanding: they show that the lattice component perpendicular to the sound propagation increases the sound speed while the lattice component parallel to the propagation decreases the sound speed. The various dependences of the sound speed on the lattice strength are the result of this competition.
The speed of sound of a Bose-Einstein condensate in an optical lattice is studied both analytically and numerically in all spatial three dimensions. Our investigation shows that the sound speed depends strongly on the strength of the lattice. In the one-dimensional case, the speed of sound falls monotonically with increasing lattice strength. The dependence on lattice strength becomes much richer in two and three dimensions. In the two-dimensional case, when the interaction is weak, the sound speed first increases and then decreases as the lattice strength increases. For the three-dimensional lattice, the sound speed can even oscillate with the lattice strength. These rich behaviors can be understood in terms of compressibility and effective mass. Our analytical results in the limit of weak lattices also offer an interesting perspective to help with our understanding: they show that the lattice component perpendicular to the sound propagation increases the sound speed while the lattice component parallel to the propagation decreases the sound speed. The various dependences of the sound speed on the lattice strength are the result of this competition.
We study the phonon mode excitation of spin–orbit (SO) coupled Bose–Einstein condensates trapped in a one-dimensional optical lattice. The sound speed of the system is obtained analytically. Softening of the phonon mode, i.e., the vanishing of sound speed, in the optical lattice is revealed. When the lattice is absent, the softening of phonon mode occurs only at the phase transition point, which is not influenced by the atomic interaction and Raman coupling when the SO coupling is strong. However, when the lattice is present, the softening of phonon modes can take place in a regime near the phase transition point. Particularly, the regime is widened as lattice strength and SO coupling increase or atomic interaction decreases. The suppression of sound speed by the lattice strongly depends on atomic interaction, Raman coupling, and SO coupling. Furthermore, we find that the sound speed in plane wave phase regime and zero-momentum phase regime behaves with very different characteristics as Raman coupling and SO coupling change. In zero-momentum phase regime, sound speed monotonically increases/decreases with Raman coupling/SO coupling, while in plane wave phase regime, sound speed can either increase or decrease with Raman coupling and SO coupling, which depends on atomic interaction.
The higher-order interactions of Bose-Einstein condensate in multi-dimensional optical lattices are discussed both analytically and numerically. It is demonstrated that the effects of the higher-order atomic interactions on the sound speed and the stabilities of Bloch waves strongly depend on the lattice strength. In the presence of higher-order effects, tighter and high-dimensional lattices are confirmed to be two positive factors for maintaining the system's energetic stability, and the dynamical instability of Bloch waves can take place simultaneously with the energetic instability. In addition, we find that the higher-order interactions exhibit a long-range behavior and the long-lived coherent Bloch oscillations in a tilted optical lattice exist. Our results provide an effective way to probe the higher-order interactions in optical lattices.
We point out that the velocity of propagation of sound wavepackets in a Bose-Einstein condensate filling a three-dimensional cubic optical lattice undergoes a maximum with increasing lattice depth. For a realistic choice of parameters, the maximum sound velocity in a lattice condensate can exceed the sound velocity in a homogeneous condensate with the same average density by 30%. The maximum falls into the superfluid regime, and should be observable under currently achievable laboratory conditions.
We analyze the full set of Bloch wave stationary solutions for a Bose-Einstein condensate in the Kronig-Penney potential. We investigate the Landau instability and dynamical instability of the Bloch states in the lowest Bloch band, including the loop if it appears. The stability phase diagrams are shown to be similar as in the case of the sinusoidal optical lattice potential. We also compute the speed of sound as a function of the potential strength. The trend is shown to be similar to the sinusoidal case, reflecting our general conclusion that, in any one-dimensional periodic potential, the sound speed always falls monotonically with increasing potential strength, no matter whether the atomic interaction is weak or strong. The Kronig-Penney potential, being analytically tractable and hence more advantageous than the sinusoidal potential, therefore serves as a good model for understanding the phenomena of Bose-Einstein condensation.
We study the propagation of sound waves in a Bose-Einstein condensate trapped in a one-dimensional optical lattice. We find that the velocity of the propagation of sound wave packets decreases with increasing optical lattice depth, as predicted by the Bogoliubov theory. The strong interplay between nonlinearities and the periodicity of the external potential generates phenomena that are not present in the uniform case. Shock waves, for instance, can propagate slower than sound waves, due to the negative curvature of the dispersion relation. Moreover, nonlinear corrections to the Bogoliubov theory appear to be important even with very small density perturbations, inducing a saturation of the amplitude of the sound signal.
The sound waves, the stability of Bloch waves, the Bloch oscillation, and the self-trapping phenomenon in interacting two-component Fermi gases throughout the BEC-BCS crossover in one-dimensional (1D), two-dimensional (2D), and three-dimensional (3D) optical lattices are discussed in detail. Within the hydrodynamical theory and by using the perturbative and tight-binding approximation, sound speed in both weak and tight 1D, 2D, 3D optical lattices, and the criteria for occurrences of instability of Bloch waves and self-trapping of Fermi gases along the whole BEC-BCS crossover in tight 1D, 2D, 3D optical lattices are obtained analytically. The results show that the sound speed, the criteria for occurrences of instability of Bloch waves and self-trapping, and the destruction of Bloch oscillation are modified dramatically by the lattice parameters (lattice dimension and lattice strength), the atom density or atom number, and the atom interaction.