Condensation in finite assemblies of non-interacting Bose-Einstein particles

Joseph V. Pulé

Zheng Yong

Based on grand canonical assembles statistics,the Bose Einstein Condensation (BEC) in non interacting bound atomic system is studied.Some basic concepts of BEC in conventional infinite Bose system are extended.The condition of chemical potential μ ≤0 will not be guarantted for the present finite bound system,and the vapour with μ 0,the state without condensation at any eigenstate,might be possible in principle even below a critical temperature T C .Gibbs functions for both the gas and the BEC state at temperature TT C have been calculated.The condition for BEC to appear is presented.The relation of BEC temperature T C with the density of particles is estimated and the result is qualitatively in good agreement with the experimental results.

Louis Goldstein

The condition which has to be fulfilled in order that the Bose-Einstein condensation be accompanied by a discontinuity of the heat capacity at the condensation temperature is discussed. The nature of the transition depends on the distribution of the energy levels of the individual particles forming the gas. The condensation is studied for several types of individual energy spectra. It is shown that all those Bose-Einstein (B.E.) assemblies which admit a non-ambiguous definition of the statistical distribution function present, beside interesting analogies, a qualitatively different behavior from that observed in liquid helium. It appears that as long as the transition in momentum space of non-ideal B.E. systems is not understood, the possibility of connection between B.E. condensation and the transition observed in liquid helium remains an open problem.

Fabrizio Tafuri, C. A. Perroni, G. De Filippis

Wenji Deng, P.M. Hui

Nicolas Rougerie

How and why could an interacting system of many particles be described as if all particles were independent and identically distributed? This question is at least as old as statistical mechanics itself. Its quantum version has been rejuvenated by the birth of cold atoms physics. In particular, the experimental creation of Bose–Einstein condensates leads to the following variant: why and how can a large assembly of very cold interacting bosons (quantum particles deprived of the Pauli exclusion principle) all populate the same quantum state? In this text I review the various mathematical techniques allowing to prove that the lowest energy state of a bosonic system forms, in a reasonable macroscopic limit of large particle number, a Bose–Einstein condensate. This means that indeed in the relevant limit all particles approximately behave as if independent and identically distributed, according to a law determined by minimizing a non-linear Schrödinger energy functional. This is a particular instance of the justification of the mean-field approximation in statistical mechanics, starting from the basic many-body Schrödinger Hamiltonian.