Several aspects of superfluidity in an atomic Bose-Einstein Condensate are studied in a torus-type quasi-1D model. The critical velocity of the superfluid in this quasi-1D model is found to differ from the conventional concept of the limit of velocity for frictionless flow. This result is one of the unique features of the quasi-1D system. For a generalized discrete quasi-1D model, the stability of Bloch oscillations is studied. The quasi-particle spectrum of small oscillations is analyzed, which in turn gives the phase diagram of the stable-unstable region. The results are in good agreement with a recent experimental observation. Last, we consider an experiment proposal where a phase-imprinting technique is used to generate superfluid flow with fixed momentum or a vortex in atomic BEC. Our study shows that because of backflow generated by part of the imprinting potential, phase imprinting is not an ideal tool to generate a single-momentum superflow or single vortex. ^
Several aspects of superfluidity in an atomic Bose-Einstein Condensate are studied in a torus-type quasi-1D model. The critical velocity of the superfluid in this quasi-1D model is found to differ from the conventional concept of the limit of velocity for frictionless flow. This result is one of the unique features of the quasi-1D system. For a generalized discrete quasi-1D model, the stability of Bloch oscillations is studied. The quasi-particle spectrum of small oscillations is analyzed, which in turn gives the phase diagram of the stable-unstable region. The results are in good agreement with a recent experimental observation. Last, we consider an experiment proposal where a phase-imprinting technique is used to generate superfluid flow with fixed momentum or a vortex in atomic BEC. Our study shows that because of backflow generated by part of the imprinting potential, phase imprinting is not an ideal tool to generate a single-momentum superflow or single vortex. ^
Superfluidity is a remarkable phenomenon. Superfluidity was initially characterized by flow without friction, first seen in liquid helium in 1938, and has been studied extensively since. Superfluidity is believed to be related to, but not identical to Bose-Einstein condensation, a statistical mechanical phenomena predicted by Albert Einstein in 1924 based on the statistics of Satyendra Nath Bose, where bosonic atoms make a phase transition to form a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), a gas which has macroscopic occupation of a single quantum state. Developments in laser cooling of neutral atoms and the subsequent realization of Bose-Einstein condensates in ultracold gases have opened a new window into the study of superfluidity and its relation to Bose-Einstein condensation. In our atomic sodium BEC experiment, we studied superfluidity and dissipationless flow in an all-optical toroidal trap, constructed using the combination of a horizontal ``sheet''-like beam and vertical ``ring''-like beam, which, like a circuit loop, allows flow around the ring. On inducing a single quantum of circulation in the condensate, the smoothness and uniformity of the toroidal BEC enabled the sustaining of a persistent current lasting 40 seconds, limited by the lifetime of the BEC due to background gas pressure. This success set the stage for further experiments studying superfluidity. In a first set of experiments, we studied the stability of the persistent current by inserting a barrier in the flow path of the ring. The superflow stopped abruptly at a barrier strength such that the local flow velocity at the barrier exceeded a critical velocity, which supported decay via the creation of a vortex-antivortex pair. Our precise control in inducing and arresting superflow in the BEC is a first step toward studying other aspects of superfluidity, such as the effect of temperature and dimensionality. This thesis discusses these experiments and also details partial-transfer absorption imaging, an imaging technique developed in the course of this work.
We investigate the superfluid properties of a Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) trapped in a one-dimensional periodic potential. We study, both analytically (in the tight binding limit) and numerically, the Bloch chemical potential, the Bloch energy and the Bogoliubov dispersion relation, and we introduce two different, density dependent, effective masses and group velocities. The Bogoliubov spectrum predicts the existence of sound waves, and the arising of energetic and dynamical instabilities at critical values of the BEC quasi-momentum which dramatically affect its coherence properties. We investigate the dependence of the dipole and Bloch oscillation frequencies in terms of an effective mass averaged over the density of the condensate. We illustrate our results with several animations obtained solving numerically the time-dependent Gross–Pitaevskii equation.
This thesis examines the manifestation of the critical velocity for superfluidity in dilute gas Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs). Superfluidity is a macroscopic quantum phenomenon characterised by unique properties such as frictionless flow, high thermal conductivity and the presence of quantised vortices. Our study focuses on what is arguably the most well-known attribute: the ability for an object to move through a superfluid without experiencing a drag force when travelling below a threshold critical velocity.The Landau criterion for superfluidity predicts the critical velocity in a BEC is equal to the speed of sound, and this conclusion is supported by a large body of theoretical work. However, a number of experiments have observed lower critical velocities than theory predicts. In the first part of this thesis, we numerically model experiments on the superfluid critical velocity of an elongated, harmonically trapped Bose-Einstein condensate as reported by [P. Engels and C. Atherton, Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 160405 (2007)]. These experiments swept a repulsive obstacle, formed by a optical dipole potential, through the long axis of a condensate at constant velocity. Their results found an increase in the resulting density fluctuations of the condensate above an obstacle velocity of v _ 0:3 mm s
Quantum vortices in superfluid Bose Einstein condensates (BECs) are excellent candidates\nfor studying hydrodynamic phenomena, such as turbulence and chaos, due to the\nquantization of vortex circulation and the absence of dissipation in BECs. Since the early\n2000s, many experimental groups have successfully observed vortices in dilute atomic\nBECs.\n\nThis work mainly focuses on creating quantum chaos with a few vortices in a twodimensional\nBEC of Rubidium87. We use graphics processing unit (GPU) computing methods to simulate our BEC trapped inside a harmonic potential with tight trapping in one direction. The quantum vortices are created by rotating the condensate. After generating the ground state of the BEC with a small number of singly charged vortices with positive phase winding, we imprint a 4\\pi phase winding on top of one vortex in the opposite orientation to that of the original vortex. This phase imprinting annihilates the preexisting vortex and creates a new singly-charged vortex with negative phase winding. Due to the high resolution of our system and an excellent vortex tracking algorithm, the location of phase imprinting can be delicately controlled.\n\nBoth the individual vortex dynamics and the dynamics of the entire system of vortices\nafter flipping a vortex have shown strong signs of chaos. This chaotic nature is\nfurther confirmed both qualitatively and quantitatively by employing two chaos indicators\non our numerical results. These chaos indicators are the Lyapunov exponent spectrum\nand the Smaller ALignment Index (SALI). The Lyapunov exponent remains positive and\nconverges to a positive value during an experimentally realistic time period, which is the\nsmoking gun for chaotic behaviour.
The combination of multi-component Bose–Einstein condensates (BECs) and phase imprinting techniques provides an ideal platform for exploring nonlinear dynamics and investigating the quantum transport properties of superfluids. In this paper, we study abundant density structures and corresponding dynamics of phase-separated binary Bose–Einstein condensates with phase-imprinted single vortex or vortex dipole. By adjusting the ratio between the inter-species and intra-species interactions, and the locations of the phase singularities, the typical density profiles such as ball-shell structures, crescent-gibbous structures, Matryoshka-like structures, sector-sector structures and sandwich-type structures appear, and the phase diagrams are obtained. The dynamics of these structures exhibit diverse properties, including the penetration of vortex dipoles, emergence of halfvortex dipoles, co-rotation of sectors, and oscillation between sectors. The pinning effects induced by a potential defect are also discussed, which is useful for controlling and manipulating individual quantum states.
Liquid helium 4 had been the only bosonic superfluid available in experiments for a long time. This situation was changed in 1995, when a new superfluid was born with the realization of the Bose–Einstein condensation in ultracold atomic gases. The liquid helium 4 is strongly interacting and has no spin; there is almost no way to change its parameters, such as interaction strength and density. The new superfluid, Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC), offers various advantages over liquid helium. On the one hand, BEC is weakly interacting and has spin degrees of freedom. On the other hand, it is convenient to tune almost all the parameters of a BEC, for example, the kinetic energy by spin–orbit coupling, the density by the external potential, and the interaction by Feshbach resonance. Great efforts have been devoted to studying these new aspects, and the results have greatly enriched our understanding of superfluidity. Here we review these developments by focusing on the stability and critical velocity of various superfluids. The BEC systems considered include a uniform superfluid in free space, a superfluid with its density periodically modulated, a superfluid with artificially engineered spin–orbit coupling, and a superfluid of pure spin current. Due to the weak interaction, these BEC systems can be well described by the mean-field Gross–Pitaevskii theory and their superfluidity, in particular critical velocities, can be examined with the aid of Bogoliubov excitations. Experimental proposals to observe these new aspects of superfluidity are discussed.