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Physical Review A

Visibility limit in multiparticle eigenstates of definite relative phase

John H. Marburger, Kunal K. Das

Published Mar 1, 1999• 7 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We show that if two multiply occupied boson modes are in eigenstates of the Hermitian relative phase operator, then the visibility of fringes formed by the interference between the modes is necessarily less than unity. For large total occupation numbers the visibility becomes $V<~\ensuremath{\pi}/4.$ States with definite relative phase and unit visibility do exist. They are related to coherent states and are not orthogonal (not eigenstates of a Hermitian phase operator). This visibility limitation may make it possible to investigate experimentally the physical role of the relative phase eigenstates in interference measurements such as those on Bose-Einstein condensates.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.59.2213

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We show that if two multiply occupied boson modes are in eigenstates of the Hermitian relative phase operator, then the visibility of fringes formed by the interference between the modes is necessarily less than unity. For large total occupation numbers the visibility becomes V< \ensuremathπ/4.V<~\ensuremath{\pi}/4.V< \ensuremathπ/4. States with definite relative phase and unit visibility do exist. They are related to coherent states and are not orthogonal (not eigenstates of a Hermitian phase operator). This visibility limitation may make it possible to investigate experimentally the physical role of the relative phase eigenstates in interference measurements such as those on Bose-Einstein condensates.
In a recent paper Marburger and Das [J. H. Marburger III and K. K. Das, Phys. Rev. A 59, 2213 (1999)] considered an interference visibility experiment involving two weakly interacting Bose-Einstein condensates. It was shown that condensate eigenstates of the Hermitian relative phase operator do not give interference fringes with unit visibility in a Young's double slit type of experiment. The authors concluded that ``\dots{} these states are not especially well suited to describe weakly interacting multiply occupied coherent bosonic systems.'' In this work we suggest a criterion for states with a well-defined relative phase. Subsequently we show that the relative phase operator eigenstates satisfy this criterion. This suggests that the concept of interference visibility can, and should, be generalized, since it is widely believed that interference visibility is a measure of the relative phase properties. We therefore propose a broader, but still operational, definition of interference visibility, which we call generalized visibility, and prove that the relative phase operator eigenstates indeed can show unit generalized visibility. We also derive a simple, but general, criterion for states which can display a unit generalized visibility. Somewhat surprisingly, this criterion is weaker than the criterion for a well-defined relative phase. Finally, we discuss which two-mode states can display unit (ordinary) visibility.
Relative phase is treated as a physical quantity for two mode systems in quantum atom optics, adapting the Pegg-Barnett treatment of quantum optical phase to define a linear Hermitian relative phase operator via first introducing a complete orthonormal set of relative phase eigenstates. These states are contrasted with other so-called phase states. Other approaches to treating phase and previous attempts to find a Hermitian phase operator are discussed. The relative phase eigenstate has maximal two mode entanglement, it is a fragmented state with its Bloch vector lying inside the Bloch sphere and is highly spin squeezed. The relative phase states are applied to describing interferometry experiments with Bose-Einstein condensates (BEC), particularly in the context of a proposed Heisenberg limited interferometry experiment. For a relative phase eigenstate the fractional fluctuation in one spin operator component perpendicular to the Bloch vector is essentially only of order 1/N, so if such a highly spin squeezed state could be prepared it may be useful for Heisenberg limited interferometry. An approach for preparing a BEC in a state close to a relative phase state is suggested, based on adiabatically changing parameters in the Josephson Hamiltonian starting from a suitable energy eigenstate in the Rabi regime.
The visibility of the density interference pattern of two Bose-Einstein condensates, which are produced in traps and overlap after the trapping potential is switched off, is investigated. Coherent wave packets are used to describe the order parameter in a second-quantization formalism. This results in a decrease of the visibility of the interference fringes with increasing time delay between the formation of the condensates and the observation of interference. In the two limiting cases of ideal and very dense gases the correlation time increases, τ →∞, and the result is identical to that obtained using an approach based on the Gross-Pitaevskii equation. Under the conditions of the experiment performed by M. R. Andrews, C. G. Townsend, H. J. Miesner et al. , Science 275 , 6367 (1997), the computed correlation time τ ≈0.2 s is much longer than the confinement time of the condensate, and it is possible to observe the predicted decrease of visibility of the interference fringes of the density of the atoms.
We suggest an experiment to investigate interference effects between two spatially separated Bose-Einstein condensates. In the presence of coherence, the dynamic structure factor, measurable through inelastic photon scattering, is predicted to exhibit, at high momentum transfer qqq, interference fringes with frequency period $\ensuremath{\Delta}\ensuremath{\nu}\phantom{\rule{0ex}{0ex}}=\phantom{\rule{0ex}{0ex}}q/\mathrm{md}$, where ddd is the distance between the condensates. We show that this coherent configuration corresponds to an eigenstate of the physical observable measured in the experiment and that the relative phase of the condensates can be, hence, created through the measurement process.