arXiv:1905.03690 · Physical Review Letters
Excitation Modes of Bright Matter-Wave Solitons
Andrea Di Carli, Craig D. Colquhoun, Grant W. Henderson, Stuart Flannigan, Gian‐Luca Oppo, Andrew J. Daley, Stefan Kuhr, Elmar Haller
Abstract
We experimentally study the excitation modes of bright matter-wave solitons in a quasi-one-dimensional geometry. The solitons are created by quenching the interactions of a Bose-Einstein condensate of cesium atoms from repulsive to attractive in combination with a rapid reduction of the longitudinal confinement. A deliberate mismatch of quench parameters allows for the excitation of breathing modes of the emerging soliton and for the determination of its breathing frequency as a function of atom number and confinement. In addition, we observe signatures of higher-order solitons and the splitting of the wave packet after the quench. Our experimental results are compared to analytical predictions and to numerical simulations of the one-dimensional Gross-Pitaevskii equation.