Thermal fluctuations and melting transitions for rotating single-component superfluids have been intensively studied and are well understood. In contrast, the thermal effects on vortex states for two-component superfluids with density-density interaction, which have a much richer variety of vortex ground states, have been much less studied. Here, we investigate the thermal effects on vortex matter in superfluids with $\mathrm{U}(1)\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}\mathrm{U}(1)$ broken symmetries and intercomponent density-density interactions, as well as the case with a larger
SU(2) broken symmetry obtainable from the $[\mathrm{U}(1)\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}\mathrm{U}(1)]$-symmetric case by tuning scattering lengths. In the former case we find that, in addition to first-order melting transitions, the system exhibits thermally driven phase transitions between square and hexagonal lattices. Our main result, however, concerns the case where the condensate exhibits
SU(2) symmetry, and where vortices are not topological. At finite temperature, the system exhibits effects which do not have a counterpart in single-component systems. Namely, it has a state where thermally averaged quantities show no regular vortex lattice, yet the system retains superfluid coherence along the axis of rotation. In such a state, the thermal fluctuations result in transitions between different (nearly) degenerate vortex states without undergoing a melting transition. Our results apply to multicomponent Bose-Einstein condensates, and we suggest how to detect some of these unusual effects experimentally in such systems.
In a single-component superfluid under rotation a broken symmetry in the order parameter space results in a broken translational symmetry in real space: a vortex lattice. If translational symmetry is restored, the phase of the order parameter disorders and thus the broken symmetry in the order parameter space is also restored. We show that for Bose-Einstein condensate mixtures in optical lattices with negative dissipationless drag, a new situation arises. This state is a modulated vortex liquid which breaks translational symmetry in the direction transverse to the rotation vector.