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American Journal of Physics

Numerical analysis of Bose–Einstein condensation in a three-dimensional harmonic oscillator potential

Martin Ligare

Published Mar 1, 1998• 26 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Bose–Einstein condensation is the anomalous accumulation of particles in the ground state of a system of bosons, when compared with the population in a system of particles obeying classical statistics. I use undergraduate-level statistical mechanics and a symbolic algebra computer program to study the occupation numbers of the energy levels of a finite number of noninteracting particles confined in a three-dimensional harmonic oscillator potential. I also calculate the heat capacity of the gas. The harmonic oscillator potential simplifies the calculations and approximates the conditions of the recent experiments achieving Bose–Einstein condensation in laser-cooled alkali vapors.

DOI
10.1119/1.18843

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Bose–Einstein condensation is the anomalous accumulation of particles in the ground state of a system of bosons, when compared with the population in a system of particles obeying classical statistics. I use undergraduate-level statistical mechanics and a symbolic algebra computer program to study the occupation numbers of the energy levels of a finite number of noninteracting particles confined in a three-dimensional harmonic oscillator potential. I also calculate the heat capacity of the gas. The harmonic oscillator potential simplifies the calculations and approximates the conditions of the recent experiments achieving Bose–Einstein condensation in laser-cooled alkali vapors.
Abstract We study Bose-Einstein condensation of comparatively small numbers of atoms trapped by a three-dimensional harmonic oscillator potential. Under the assumption that grand canonical statis­tics applies, we derive analytical expressions for the condensation temperature, the ground state occupation, and the specific heat capacity. For a gas of TV atoms the condensation temperature is proportional to N1/3, apart from a downward shift of order N-1/3. A signature of the condensation is a pronounced peak of the heat capacity. For not too small N the heat capacity is nearly discon­tinuous at the onset of condensation; the magnitude of the jump is about 6.6 N k. Our continuum approximations are derived with the help of the proper density of states which allows us to calculate finite-AT-corrections, and checked against numerical computations.
We study the thermodynamic behavior of an ideal gas of bosons trapped in a three-dimensional anisotropic harmonic-oscillator potential. The condensate fraction as well as the specific heat is calculated using the Euler-Maclaurin approximation. For a finite number of particles there is no phase transition, but there is a well-defined temperature at which the condensation starts. We also consider condensation in lower dimensions, and, for one-dimensional systems, we discuss the dependence of the condensate fraction and heat capacity on the ensemble used.
We present an analysis of Bose-Einstein condensation for a system of noninteracting spin-0 particles in a harmonic-oscillator confining potential trap. We discuss why a confined system of particles differs both qualitatively and quantitatively from an identical system which is not confined. One crucial difference is that a confined system is not characterized by a critical temperature in the same way as an unconfined system such as the free boson gas. We present the results of both a numerical and analytic analysis of the problem of Bose-Einstein condensation in a general anisotropic harmonic-oscillator confining potential. \textcopyright{} 1996 The American Physical Society.
Abstract The Bose-Einstein condensation of a gas is investigated. Starting from the well-known formulae for Bose statistics, the problem has been generalized to include a variety of potential fields in which the particles of the gas move, and the number w of dimensions has not been restricted to three. The energy levels are taken to be εi≡εs1,....,s10=constanth2ms1α−1a12+...+swαaw2(1≤α≤2) the quantum numbers being s1 ,w= 1, 2, ..., and a1, ..., aw being certain characteristic lengths. (For α = 2, the potential field is that of the w-dimensional rectangular box; for α = 1, we obtain the w-dimensional harmonic oscillator field.) A direct rigorous method is used similar to that proposed by Fowler & Jones (1938). It is shown that the number q = w/α determines the appearance of an Einstein transition temperature T0·For q≤ 1 there is no such point, while for q > 1 a transition point exists. For 1 < q≤ 2, the mean energy ϵ- per particle and the specific heat dϵ-/dT are continuous at T = T0· For q > 2, the specific heat is discontinuous at T = T0, giving rise to a A λ-point. A well-defined transition point only appears for a very large (theoretically infinite) number N of particles. T0 is finite only if the quantity v = N/(a1 .... aw)2/ α¯is finite. For a rectangular box, v is equal to the mean density of the gas. If v tends to zero or infinity as N→ ∞, then T0 likewise tends to zero or infinity. In the case q > 1, and at temperatures T < T 0' there is a finite fraction N0 /N of the particles, given by N 0/N = 1-(T/T0)q, in the lowest state. London’s formula (1938 b) for the three-dimensional box is an example of this equation. Some further results are also compared with those given by London’s continuous spectrum approximation.
The Bose-Einstein condensation of a dilute gas of rubidium-87 atoms was achieved by cooling a small number of atoms in a magnetic trap. The effective potential of the trap is to lowest order harmonic and under these conditions we estimate the critical temperature and the heat capacity of an ideal gas of Bose particles. Previously this has been estimated within the semiclassical approximation. However, because of the small number of atoms, the resulting TcT_cTc​ deviates slightly from our result obtained by exact numerical calculations. For the gap of the heat capacity at the transition point the deviation is 20%20\%20%.