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arXiv:0707.0403 · Physical Review Letters

Dynamical Control of Matter-Wave Tunneling in Periodic Potentials

Hans Lignier, Carlo Sias, D. Ciampini, Yeshpal Singh, Alessandro Zenesini, O. Morsch, E. Arimondo

Published Nov 27, 2007• 645 citations

Abstract

We report on measurements of dynamical suppression of interwell tunneling of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) in a strongly driven optical lattice. The strong driving is a sinusoidal shaking of the lattice corresponding to a time-varying linear potential, and the tunneling is measured by letting the BEC freely expand in the lattice. The measured tunneling rate is reduced and, for certain values of the shaking parameter, completely suppressed. Our results are in excellent agreement with theoretical predictions. Furthermore, we have verified that, in general, the strong shaking does not destroy the phase coherence of the BEC, opening up the possibility of realizing quantum phase transitions by using the shaking strength as the control parameter.

DOI: 10.1103/physrevlett.99.220403

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We have observed tunneling suppression and photon-assisted tunneling of Bose-Einstein condensates in an optical lattice subjected to a constant force plus a sinusoidal shaking. For a sufficiently large constant force, the ground energy levels of the lattice are shifted out of resonance and tunneling is suppressed; when the shaking is switched on, the levels are coupled by low-frequency photons and tunneling resumes. Our results agree well with theoretical predictions and demonstrate the usefulness of optical lattices for studying solid-state phenomena.

A parametrically forced Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is studied in the mean field approach for the case of a general moving optical lattice. The interaction between the atoms in the condensate and the time dependent lattice potential leads to a novel propagating superfluid matter wave, which can be controlled through chirp management. This system, when placed in a trap, accelerates and undergoes rapid nonlinear compression, controlled by the chirp. The density achieves its maximum, precisely when the matter wave changes direction. A dynamical phase transition is identified, which takes the superfluid phase to an insulating state. The exact expression for energy is obtained and analyzed in detail to gain physical understanding of the chirp management of the sinusoidal excitations and also the dynamical phase transition.