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arXiv:1101.2070 · Physical Review A

Variational calculations for anisotropic solitons in dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates

Rüdiger Eichler, Jörg Main, Günter Wunner

Published May 3, 2011• 25 citations
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Abstract

We present variational calculations using a Gaussian trial function to calculate the ground state of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation (GPE) and to describe the dynamics of the quasi-two-dimensional solitons in dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs). Furthermore, we extend the ansatz to a linear superposition of Gaussians, improving the results for the ground state to exact agreement with numerical grid calculations using imaginary time and the split-operator method. We are able to give boundaries for the scattering length at which stable solitons may be observed in an experiment. By dynamic calculations with coupled Gaussians, we are able to describe the rather complex behavior of the thermally excited solitons. The discovery of dynamically stabilized solitons indicates the existence of such BECs at experimentally accessible temperatures.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.83.053604

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We present variational calculations using a Gaussian trial function to calculate the ground state of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation (GPE) and to describe the dynamics of the quasi-two-dimensional solitons in dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs). Furthermore, we extend the ansatz to a linear superposition of Gaussians, improving the results for the ground state to exact agreement with numerical grid calculations using imaginary time and the split-operator method. We are able to give boundaries for the scattering length at which stable solitons may be observed in an experiment. By dynamic calculations with coupled Gaussians, we are able to describe the rather complex behavior of the thermally excited solitons. The discovery of dynamically stabilized solitons indicates the existence of such BECs at experimentally accessible temperatures.
We investigate the coherent collision of anisotropic quasi-two-dimensional bright solitons in dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates. Our analysis is based on the extended Gross-Pitaevskii equation, and we use the split-operator method for the grid calculations and the time-dependent variational principle with an Ansatz of coupled Gaussian functions to calculate the time evolution of the ground state. We compare the results of both approaches for collisions where initially the solitons are in the repelling side-by-side configuration and move towards each other with a specific momentum. We change the relative phases of the condensates, and introduce a total angular momentum by shifting the solitons in opposite directions along the polarization axis. Our calculations show that collisions result in breathing-mode-like excitations of the solitons.
In this work several aspects of dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates are investigated. These condensates have attracted much interest since their experimental realization and offer the chance to explore the novel, fascinating, and sometimes unexpected physics originating from the dipole-dipole interaction. For the theoretical description the time-dependent variational principle with an ansatz of coupled Gaussian wave packets is applied to the analysis of this form of matter. In order to describe physical systems, where the shape of the condensate wave function cannot be approximated adequately by origin-centered Gaussian functions, translational and rotational degrees of freedom of the particular wave packets are included. This provides not only a full-fledged alternative method to full-numerical grid calculations that are demanding in computation time, used for the determination of ground states and investigation of the real-time dynamics, but also allows for the calculation of excited states and the examination of stability properties and offers the possibility for a deeper physical understanding of dipolar condensates. The variational method is applied to three different physical systems. In the first one anisotropic quasi-two-dimensional solitons are investigated. Ground states and small excitations are presented and the full flexibility of the approach is utilized in the simulation of the collision of two solitons. Thereby simulations of collisions are performed, where initially the solitons are in the repelling side-by-side configuration and move towards each other with a specific momentum. It is shown that the results are in excellent agreement with full-numerical grid calculations. Collisions with various initial parameters such as the initial momentum and impact factor are performed, allowing to classify the qualitative interactions of two solitons and illuminating the effects of the solitons' two-dimensional nature on the collision process. In the second system dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates in a triple-well potential are investigated. This constitutes a well-suited model system for periodic optical potentials with important contributions of the non-local and anisotropic dipole-dipole interaction, which show a variety of effects such as self-organization and formation of patterns. Here, a macroscopic sample of dipolar bosons in the mean-field limit is addressed. The analysis goes beyond the calculation of ground states and clarifies the role of excited and metastable states in such systems. In particular, the formation of phases is found to originate from the interplay of several states with distinct stability properties. As some of the phases are formed by metastable states, special attention is paid to the characteristics of phase transitions in real time and the dynamical stabilization of the condensate. The dynamical simulations that support these results, constitute a way for an experimental observation of these findings. The third physical application is an open quantum system. Here, an external potential models gain and loss of particles and features parity with simultaneous time-reversal symmetry. For these dipolar condensates real eigenvalues of the nonlinear Hamiltonian are found, preserving the PT-symmetry of the external potential, as well as states that break this symmetry. A detailed stability analysis of these, in general complex states, is performed. The comparison with a similar system featuring a non-dipolar condensate demonstrates the role of the dipolar interaction for novel effects. Furthermore, the real-time dynamics is investigated, which reveals, among other effects, long-living oscillations of the two wells' population.
We suggest a simple Gaussian Lagrangian variational scheme for the reduced time-dependent quasi-one-and quasi-two-dimensional Gross-Pitaevskii (GP) equations of a dipolar Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) in cigar and disk configurations, respectively. The variational approximation for stationary states and breathing oscillation dynamics in reduced dimensions agrees well with the numerical solution of the GP equation even for moderately large short-range and dipolar nonlinearities. The Lagrangian variational scheme also provides much physical insight about soliton formation in dipolar BEC.
Abstract Two bright solitons in a dipolar Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) can form stable bound states, known as soliton molecules. In this paper we study the scattering of a two-soliton molecule by external potential, using the simplest and analytically tractable Gaussian potential barriers and wells, in one spatial dimension. Collisions of soliton molecules with single solitons are investigated, the latter playing the role of a localized defect. Due to the long-range character of dipolar forces solitons interact with each other even though their waveforms do not appreciably overlap. This is an essentially different feature of dipolar solitons compared to their counterparts in BECs with contact atomic interactions. The result of scattering significantly depends on the potential’s strength and velocity of collision. For weak potentials and/or low velocity the molecule preserves its coherence, meantime the internal modes are excited. Scattering by strong potentials at moderately high velocity ends up with dissociation of the molecule. The theoretical model is based on the variational approximation for the nonlocal Gross–Pitaevskii equation (GPE). Predictions of the mathematical model are compared with numerical simulations of the nonlocal GPE, and good qualitative agreement between them is demonstrated.
Bose-Einstein condensates with an attractive 1/r1/r1/r interaction and with dipole-dipole interaction are investigated in the framework of the Gaussian variational ansatz introduced by S. Rau, J. Main, and G. Wunner [Phys. Rev. A 82, 023610 (2010)]. We demonstrate that the method of coupled Gaussian wave packets is a full-fledged alternative to direct numerical solutions of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation, or even superior in that coupled Gaussians are capable of producing both stable and unstable states of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation and thus of giving access to yet unexplored regions of the space of solutions of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation. As an alternative to numerical solutions of the Bogoliubov--de Gennes equations, the stability of the stationary condensate wave functions is investigated by analyzing the stability properties of the dynamical equations of motion for the Gaussian variational parameters in the local vicinity of the stationary fixed points. For blood-cell-shaped dipolar condensates it is shown that on the route to collapse the condensate passes through a pitchfork bifurcation, where the ground state itself turns unstable, before it finally vanishes in a tangent bifurcation.
We consider dynamical stabilization of Bose-Einstein condensates by time-dependent modulation of the scattering length. The problem has been studied before by several methods: Gaussian variational approximation, the method of moments, the method of modulated Townes soliton, and the direct averaging of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation. We summarize these methods and find that the numerically obtained stabilized solution has a different configuration than that assumed by the theoretical methods (in particular a phase of the wave function is not quadratic with rrr). We show that there is presently no clear evidence for stabilization in a strict sense, because in the numerical experiments only metastable (slowly decaying) solutions have been obtained. In other words, neither numerical nor mathematical evidence for a new kind of soliton solutions has been revealed so far. The existence of the metastable solutions is nevertheless an interesting and complicated phenomenon on its own. We try some non-Gaussian variational trial functions to obtain better predictions for the critical nonlinearity gcr{g}_{cr}gcr​ for metastabilization but other dynamical properties of the solutions remain difficult to predict.