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arXiv:1103.2994 · New Journal of Physics

Resonant Hawking radiation in Bose–Einstein condensates

Ivar Zapata, Mathias Albert, Renaud Parentani, Fernando Sols

Published Jun 29, 2011• 57 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We study double-barrier interfaces separating regions of asymptotically subsonic and supersonic flow of Bose-condensed atoms. These setups contain at least one black hole sonic horizon from which the analogue of Hawking radiation should be generated and emitted against the flow in the subsonic region. Multiple coherent scattering by the double-barrier structure strongly modulates the transmission probability of phonons, rendering it very sensitive to their frequency. As a result, resonant tunneling occurs with high probability within a few narrow frequency intervals. This gives rise to highly non-thermal spectra with sharp peaks. We find that these peaks are mostly associated with decaying resonances and only occasionally with dynamical instabilities. Even at achievable non-zero temperatures, the radiation peaks can be dominated by spontaneous emission, i.e. enhanced zero-point fluctuations, and not, as is often the case in analogue models, by stimulated emission.

DOI
10.1088/1367-2630/13/6/063048

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We study double-barrier interfaces separating regions of asymptotically subsonic and supersonic flow of Bose-condensed atoms. These setups contain at least one black hole sonic horizon from which the analogue of Hawking radiation should be generated and emitted against the flow in the subsonic region. Multiple coherent scattering by the double-barrier structure strongly modulates the transmission probability of phonons, rendering it very sensitive to their frequency. As a result, resonant tunneling occurs with high probability within a few narrow frequency intervals. This gives rise to highly non-thermal spectra with sharp peaks. We find that these peaks are mostly associated with decaying resonances and only occasionally with dynamical instabilities. Even at achievable non-zero temperatures, the radiation peaks can be dominated by spontaneous emission, i.e. enhanced zero-point fluctuations, and not, as is often the case in analogue models, by stimulated emission.
The violation of a classical Cauchy-Schwarz (CS) inequality is identified as an unequivocal signature of spontaneous Hawking radiation in sonic black holes. This violation can be particularly large near the peaks in the radiation spectrum emitted from a resonant boson structure forming a sonic horizon. As a function of the frequency-dependent Hawking radiation intensity, we analyze the degree of CS violation and the maximum violation temperature for a double barrier structure separating two regions of subsonic and supersonic condensate flow. We also consider the case where the resonant sonic horizon is produced by a space-dependent contact interaction. In some cases, CS violation can be observed by direct atom counting in a time-of-flight experiment. We show that near the conventional zero-frequency peak, the decisive CS violation cannot occur.
The violation of a classical Cauchy-Schwarz (CS) inequality is identified as an unequivocal signature of spontaneous Hawking radiation in sonic black holes. This violation can be particularly large near the peaks in the radiation spectrum emitted from a resonant boson structure forming a sonic horizon. As a function of the frequency-dependent Hawking radiation intensity, we analyze the degree of CS violation and the maximum violation temperature for a double barrier structure separating two regions of subsonic and supersonic condensate flow. We also consider the case where the resonant sonic horizon is produced by a space-dependent contact interaction. In some cases, CS violation can be observed by direct atom counting in a time-of-flight experiment. We show that near the conventional zero-frequency peak, the decisive CS violation cannot occur.
Hawking radiation, the spontaneous emission of thermal photons from an event horizon, is one of the most intriguing and elusive predictions of field theory in curved spacetimes. A formally analogue phenomenon occurs at the supersonic transition of a fluid: in this respect, ultracold gases stand out among the most promising systems but the theoretical modelling of this effect has always been carried out in semiclassical approximation, borrowing part of the analysis from the gravitational analogy. Here we discuss the exact solution of a one-dimensional Bose gas flowing against an obstacle, showing that spontaneous phonon emission (the analogue of Hawking radiation) is predicted without reference to the gravitational analogy. Long after the creation of the obstacle, the fluid settles into a stationary state displaying the emission of sound waves (phonons) in the upstream direction. A careful analysis shows that a precise correspondence between this phenomenon and the spontaneous emission of radiation from an event horizon requires additional conditions to be met in future experiments aimed at identifying the occurrence of the Hawking-like mechanism in Bose-Einstein condensates.
Acoustic analogues of black holes (dumb holes) are generated when a supersonic fluid flow entrains sound waves and forms a trapped region from which sound cannot escape. The surface of no return, the acoustic horizon, is qualitatively very similar to the event horizon of a general relativity black hole. In particular Hawking radiation (a thermal bath of phonons with temperature proportional to the "surface gravity") is expected to occur. In this note we consider quasi-one-dimensional supersonic flow of a Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) in a Laval nozzle (converging-diverging nozzle), with a view to finding which experimental settings could magnify this effect and provide an observable signal. We discuss constraints and problems for our model and identify the issues that should be addressed in the near future in order to set up an experiment. In particular we identify an experimentally plausible configuration with a Hawking temperature of order 70 n K; to be contrasted with a condensation temperature of the order of 90 n K.
We have studied analytically the approximate solutions to the gapped mode equations in the hydrodynamic regime for a class of binary Bose-Einstein condensate acoustic black holes. The horizon from the transonic flow is formed by manipulating the phonon sound speed and the flow velocity with the experimentally accessible parameters. The asymptotic modes of various scattering processes are constructed from which to obtain scattering coefficients and then to further decompose the field operator in terms of the asymptotic states. Also, the Unruh state is introduced to be the appropriate state for the description of gravitational collapse of the black hole. The particle densities of the outgoing modes are computed. The effective energy gap term in the dispersion relation of the gapped excitations introduces the threshold frequency ${\ensuremath{\omega}}_{r}$ in the subsonic regime, below which the propagating modes do not exist. Thus, the particle spectrum of the analogous Hawking modes in the exterior of the horizon of the subsonic region significantly deviates from that of the gapless cases near the threshold frequency due to the modified graybody factor, which vanishes as the mode frequency is below ${\ensuremath{\omega}}_{r}$. However, in the interior region of the horizon of the supersonic region, the spectrum of the particle production of the Hawking partner has the nonthermal feature. The correlators between the analog Hawking mode and its partner of relevance to the experimental observations are also investigated and show some peaks near the threshold frequency ${\ensuremath{\omega}}_{r}$ resulting from the gap energy term to be seen in future experiments.
We report numerical evidence of Hawking emission of Bogoliubov phonons from a sonic horizon in a flowing one-dimensional atomic Bose–Einstein condensate. The presence of Hawking radiation is revealed from peculiar long-range patterns in the density–density correlation function of the gas. Quantitative agreement between our fully microscopic calculations and the prediction of analog models is obtained in the hydrodynamic limit. New features are predicted and the robustness of the Hawking signal against a finite temperature discussed.