A Theory is presented to construct several types of self-trapping nonlinear modes in the two-dimensional model of binary Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) with the repulsive dipole-dipole interaction (DDI) and the spatially confined spin-orbit coupling (SOC). The spatially confined SOC can be induced by illuminating spinor BEC with a Gaussian beam. It is found that the two-dimensional SOC of Rashba type within a confined area can help trap the composite matter-wave solitons. Under the combined effects of the repulsive DDI and the SOC, stable solitons of semi-vortex type and mixed-mode type can be found in ground state as well as in excited state. These solitons can still be stable when the topological number is up to 11. The properties and stability of the nonlinear modes is also studied in a moving frame of reference.
A Theory is presented to construct several types of self-trapping nonlinear modes in the two-dimensional model of binary Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) with the repulsive dipole-dipole interaction (DDI) and the spatially confined spin-orbit coupling (SOC). The spatially confined SOC can be induced by illuminating spinor BEC with a Gaussian beam. It is found that the two-dimensional SOC of Rashba type within a confined area can help trap the composite matter-wave solitons. Under the combined effects of the repulsive DDI and the SOC, stable solitons of semi-vortex type and mixed-mode type can be found in ground state as well as in excited state. These solitons can still be stable when the topological number is up to 11. The properties and stability of the nonlinear modes is also studied in a moving frame of reference.
Solitons are self-trapped modes existing in various nonlinear systems. Creating stable solitons in two- and three-dimensional settings is a challenging goal in various branches of physics. Several methods have been developed theoretically and experimentally to achieve this, but few of them can support stable multi-dimensional solitons in free space. Recently, a new scheme using spin-orbit-coupling (SOC) has been proposed to create stable 2D solitons in Bose–Einstein condensates (BECs). This paper reviews recent theoretical progress on creating stable 2D solitons in spinor dipolar BEC with SOC, combined with long-range dipole-dipole interaction (DDI), Zeeman splitting (ZS) and contact nonlinearity, in free space. The continuous family of stable symmetric vortex solitons (SVS), asymmetric vortex solitons (AVS), as well as gap solitons (GS) is found via different settings. Their existence and stability conditions are summarized and discussed in detail. The mobility properties of these types of solitons are also addressed. For SVS, a potential method to manipulate its shape and mobility is investigated. These results are supposed to enrich our understanding of 2D solitons and help create multi-dimensional solitons in experiments.
We report families of two-dimensional (2D) composite solitons in spinor dipolar Bose-Einstein condensates, with two localized components linearly mixed by the spin-orbit coupling (SOC), and the intrinsic nonlinearity represented by the dipole-dipole interaction (DDI) between atomic magnetic moments polarized in plane by an external magnetic field. Recently, stable solitons were predicted in the form of semivortices (composites built of coupled fundamental and vortical components) in the 2D system combining the SOC and contact attractive interactions. Replacing the latter by the anisotropic long-range DDI, we demonstrate that, for a fixed norm of the soliton, the system supports a continuous family of stable spatially asymmetric vortex solitons (AVSs), parameterized by an offset of the pivot of the vortical component relative to its fundamental counterpart. The offset is limited by a certain maximum value, while the energy of the AVS practically does not depend on the offset. At small values of the norm, the vortex solitons are subject to a weak oscillatory instability. In the present system, with the Galilean invariance broken by the SOC, the composite solitons are set in motion by a kick the strength of which exceeds a certain depinning value. The kicked solitons feature a negative effective mass, drifting along a spiral trajectory opposite to the direction of the kick. A critical angular velocity, up to which the semivortices may follow rotation of the polarizing magnetic field, is found too.
We study two-dimensional (2D) matter-wave solitons in spinor Bose–Einstein condensates under the action of the spin–orbit coupling and opposite signs of the self- and cross-interactions. Stable 2D two-component solitons of the mixed-mode type are found if the cross-interaction between the components is attractive, while the self-interaction is repulsive in each component. Stable solitons of the semi-vortex type are formed in the opposite case, under the action of competing self-attraction and cross-repulsion. The solitons exist with the total norm taking values below a collapse threshold. Further, in the case of the repulsive self-interaction and inter-component attraction, stable 2D self-trapped modes, which may be considered as quantum droplets (QDs), are created if the beyond-mean-field Lee–Huang–Yang terms are added to the self-repulsion in the underlying system of coupled Gross–Pitaevskii equations. Stable QDs of the mixed-mode type, of a large size with an anisotropic density profile, exist with arbitrarily large values of the norm, as the Lee–Huang–Yang terms eliminate the collapse. The effect of the spin–orbit coupling term on characteristics of the QDs is systematically studied. We also address the existence and stability of QDs in the case of SOC with mixed Rashba and Dresselhaus terms, which makes the density profile of the QD more isotropic. Thus, QDs in the spin-orbit-coupled binary Bose–Einstein condensate are for the first time studied in the present work.
We develop a method for creating two- and one-dimensional (2D and 1D) self-trapped modes in binary spin-orbit-coupled Bose–Einstein condensates with the contact repulsive interaction, whose local strength grows sufficiently rapidly from the center to the periphery. In particular, an exact semi-vortex (SV) solution is found for the anti-Gaussian radial modulation profile. The exact modes are included in the numerically produced family of SV solitons. Other families, in the form of mixed modes (MMs), as well as excited states of SVs and MMs, are also produced. Although the excited states are unstable in all previously studied models, they are partially stable in the present one. In the 1D version of the system, exact solutions for the counterpart of SVs, namely, semi-dipole solitons, are also found. Families of semi-dipoles, as well as the 1D version of MMs, are produced numerically.
It is commonly known that two-dimensional mean-field models of optical and matter waves with cubic self-attraction cannot produce stable solitons in free space because of the occurrence of collapse in the same setting. By means of numerical analysis and variational approximation, we demonstrate that the two-component model of the Bose-Einstein condensate with the spin-orbit Rashba coupling and cubic attractive interactions gives rise to solitary-vortex complexes of two types: semivortices (SVs, with a vortex in one component and a fundamental soliton in the other), and mixed modes (MMs, with topological charges 0 and ±1 mixed in both components). These two-dimensional composite modes can be created using the trapping harmonic-oscillator (HO) potential, but remain stable in free space, if the trap is gradually removed. The SVs and MMs realize the ground state of the system, provided that the self-attraction in the two components is, respectively, stronger or weaker than the cross attraction between them. The SVs and MMs which are not the ground states are subject to a drift instability. In free space (in the absence of the HO trap), modes of both types degenerate into unstable Townes solitons when their norms attain the respective critical values, while there is no lower existence threshold for the stable modes. Moving free-space stable solitons are also found in the present non-Galilean-invariant system, up to a critical velocity. Collisions between two moving solitons lead to their merger into a single one.
It was recently found that excited states of semivortex and mixed-mode solitons are unstable in spin-orbit-coupled Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs) with contact interactions. We demonstrate a possibility to stabilize such excited states in a setting based on repulsive dipole-dipole interactions induced by a polarizing field, oriented perpendicular to the plane in which the dipolar BEC is trapped. The strength of the field is assumed to grow in the radial direction $\ensuremath{\sim}{r}^{4}$. Excited states of semivortex solitons have vorticities S and S+1 in their two components, each being an eigenstate of the angular momentum. They are fully stable up to S=5. The excited state of mixed-mode solitons feature interweaving necklace structures with opposite fractional values of the angular momentum in the two components. They are stable if they are built of dominant angular harmonics $\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}S$, with $S\ensuremath{\le}4$. The characteristics and stability of these two types of previously unknown higher-order solitons are systematically analyzed. Their characteristic size is $\ensuremath{\sim}10\phantom{\rule{0.16em}{0ex}}\ensuremath{\mu}\mathrm{m}$, with the number of atoms $\ensuremath{\lesssim}{10}^{5}$.